A short history of Anglo-Saxon freedom. The polity of the English-speaking race. Outlined in its inception, development, diffusion and present condition

xviii CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XVIII.

The Future of Anglo-Saxon Freedom.

Predictions of its wide dominance. — Views of J. K. Green,
F. B. Zincke, Gladstone. — Tlie blood of the English-speak-
ing race still pure, though enriched by foreign admix-
ture. —Views of E. A. Freeman, Matthew Arnold, K. A.
Proctor, J. Bryce, Sir Edwin Arnold. — Identity of Eng-
lish-speaking men as illustrated at the Colonial Exhibition
of 1886. — The stock never stronger or better than now. —
The troubles that beset it. — Dangers from intemperance,
licentiousness, neglect of public education. — The French
question in Canada ; fear of the Chinese in Australia ; Home
Rule in England ; in America the negro question, excessive
immigration. — The embarrassments not especially formi-
dable as compared with those of other times . . . 308

CHAPTER XIX.

Do WE KESPBCT OUR FREEDOM?

The celebration of April 30th, 1889. — The people's love of
Anglo-Saxon freedom. — Testimony of Andrew Carnegie ;
of J. Toulmin Smith. — The American and the German. —
Value in politics of the instinct of the plain people. —
View of J. Bryce, of Lecky, of Addison, of Motley, of
President C. W. Eliot of Harvard. — General confidence
of high and low in our freedom 327

CHAPTER XX.

A Fraternity or English-speaking Men.

The idea of an Anglo-Saxon brotherhood. — Views of J. R.
Seeley, of John Bright, of Sir Henry Parkes, of Sir George
Grey, of J. C. Firth, of the Westminster Review, of
the New Zealand Herald. — Australians especially cordial
to the idea. — Indifference of Americans. — Reasons for
cultivating fraternal feelings among English-speaking
lands. — English readiness to admit and make good past
mistakes.— Sir Edwin Arnold's plan of an International
Council. — Necessity of doing something to prevent Anglo-
Saxon traditions from becoming obscured. — Need to the

CONTENTS. xix

PAGE

world of Anglo-Saxon leadership. — Possible perils from
China ; from Russia. — Sketch of Russia. — Threatening
character of her vast development. — Lessing and Goethe
on the virtue of patriotism. — Love for humanity higher
than love of country. — Blessings of unification. — Tor
the abrogation of national dis.tinctions like must first
seek like. — An Anglo-Saxon fraternity a step toward the
" federation of the world " 343

APPENDIX.

A. Magna Chakta. 1215

B. Petition of Right. 1628 ....

C. Bill of Rights. 1688

D. Constitution of the United States. 1787

E. Constitution of Canada, 1867 .

371
383
386
394
399

INDEX 403

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UNIVERSITY

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Comall Unlvaralty Library
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A Short history of Anglo-Saxon freedom.

olin

3 1924 030 467 074

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Library

The original of tiiis book is in
tine Cornell University Library.

There are no known copyright restrictions in
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http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924030467074

A SHORT HISTORY OF ANGLO-SAXON
FREEDOM

A SHORT HISTORY

ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM

THE POLITY OF THE ENGLISH-SPEAKING EACE

OUTLINED IN ITS INCEPTION, DEVELOPMENT, DIFFUSION,
AND PRESENT CONDITION

BY

JAMES K. HOSMEE

Professor in Washington University; Author or "A Life of Samuel
Adams," "A Life of Young Sir Henry Vane," etc.

NEW YORK

CHAELES .^CEIBNEE'S gONS

1890

COPYRIGHT, 1890,
BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS.

. PREFACE.

In this book an effort has been made to compress a
sketch of constitutional history for a period of nearly
two thousand years, — from the time of the Teu-
tons of Csesar and Tacitus to the British Empire and
the United States of 1890. It is not the polity of
any single people that is outlined, but that of the
English-speaking race, that body to-day perhaps one
hundred and twenty millions strong, scattered in sev-
eral nationalities actual or incipient, which upon all
the continents and all the great islands of the world,
stands now so in the foreground of attention. It is a
polity one and the same in its essence in England, in
the United States, in Australia, in Canada : one and
the same in its essence, moreover, as viewed in the
institutions of to-day and in those of the North
Germans of the time of Christ. As Sir Francis Pal-
grave says : " The new building has been raised upon
the old groundwork ; the institutions of one age have
always been modelled and formed from those of the
preceding, and the lineal descent has never been
interrupted or disturbed." Anglo-Saxon freedom is
most simply and comprehensively stated in the phrase
of Abraham Lincoln, " government of the people, by
the people, and for the people." In its long history

vi PREFACE.

there have been periods of temporary submergence,
adaptation to the needs of ever vaster multitudes and
higher civilizations, manifold development and elabo-
ration : one spirit, however, has survived through all,
apparent in the deliberations of a modern Congress
or Parliament, as also it was apparent in the ancient
folk-moots, where the free ceorls chose their army
leaders and regulated the life in their marks.

While works upon the constitutional history, both
of England and America, abound, they for the most
part appeal, both as to style and size, rather to the
scholar and the statesman, than to the general reader
and the youthful student. Moreover, in such works
it has too seldom happened, that the constitutional his-
tory of the English-speaking race has been regarded
en soUdarite: but in this way it is both proper and
expedient to regard that history. England and Amer-
ica are mother and child; the polity of the latter in
its origin is a mere outflow from that of the former,
the two constitutional streams since the divergence
flowing constantly parallel and mutually reacting.
Our frequent complaint is that Englishmen fail to
understand us ; just so, we fail to understand them.
Says the Westminster Review, for March, 1889: "Eng-
land's sternest, coldest, most critical censors, I have
found among descendants of the old settlers ; surely
they retain something of ancient Puritan bitterness.
The source of estrangement I am inclined to trace
largely to the fact that the average American reads
no history but United States history, and he can
hardly be said to study that." Certainly, to set right
the "average American," and also the average Eng-
lishman, is a task worth essaying. There ought to be

PREFACE. Til

room for a book succinct and simple in its terms,
which should tell to busy men and to youth in the
cla«s-room, the story of Anglo-Saxon freedom ; for as
James Bryce has said: " It is a matter of the first con-
sequence that the relation to one another of the two
branches of the English-speaking race should be more
fully understood and realized."

In the execution of such a task the difficulties are
not small. How to preserve a proper historical per-
spective while viewing upon so reduced a scale such
a multitude of events and figures ? What guides to
select in threading one's way through the long ages ?
There is no period through which one must not pro-
ceed with care, and the embarrassments are perhaps
as great with respect to times close at hand as with
respect to times remote. While this book was in
preparation, the establishment of the County Councils
has restored to the English shires their ancient local
self-government ; since it was ready for the printer
six Commonwealths have been added to the American
Union ; as it awaits its publication, an Anglo-Saxon
protectorate extends itself more and more widely over
Africa, and the federation of Australia may become
any month an accomplished fact. These are all events
noteworthy in the history of Anglo-Saxon freedom,
as are still others of which the newspapers weekly
give report. How to catch them accurately and in
due proportion? — As to remote ages, the darkness
due to the remoteness is further deepened by the con-
troversies of scholars. The employment of represen-
tation has commonly been held to be characteristic of
Anglo-Saxon societies in the most distant epochs ;
but this honor is now denied to them by authorities

yiii PREFACE.

deserving of high respect, who find no good evidence
of the existence of a representative system until after
the Norman conquest. Mr. Frederic Seebohm, in his
" English Village Communities," fails to see that the
Anglo-Saxon invaders brought with them any free-
dom at all, as they set up their tuns and scires in
their new home : in the settlements that were estab-
lished a lord ruled as master, with a society under
him in a condition of villenage ; the free village com-
munity was by no means the type, but from the first
a marked feudalism in which the mass of men were
sei'fs.

Still more sweepingly, Mr. H. C. Coote, in his
"Romans of Britain," will have it that the Anglo-
Saxons transmitted to us not only no freedom, but
nothing else. They were simply a horde of invading
savages, exercising for a time dominion over a people
they had conquered, who much surpassed them in
civilization, — a horde which was at length annihi-
lated by the Danes, leaving no trace of itself or its
influence; for, thinks Mr. Coote, all that we have
called Anglo-Saxon, in blood, tongue, or institutions,
ought to be ascribed to a different stock, and has
received the name only through mistake. — While at
the two extremes of the subject embarrassments thus
abound, certain intermediate periods are scarcely
more free. In the English colonization of America,
for instance, the extent to which the new country
followed the precedents of the old is not a matter
upon which all are agreed. The "new historical
school," of which E. A. Freeman may be regarded as
the founde'r, and of which the most characteristic
publications in America are the historical and politi-.

PREFACE. IX

cal tracts of Johns Hopkins University, edited by-
Prof. Herbert B. Adams, is inclined to trace in mi-
nute detail in American societies the usages of
the old world, — a course for which it has been
sharply censured, sometimes by scholars of reputa-
tion.

Under these circumstances, if a time were ever likely
to arrive when doubtful questions will be any less in
doubt, it would be prudent to defer the execution of
such a task as the present one until that tim'e. "What
probability is there, however, that the mighty march
of Anglo-Saxondom will in these ages, ever press less
confusingly upon the contemporaneous chronicler;
or that as regards the past, the discord of authorities
will ever be harmonized ? The task is worth execu-
ting ; the time as propitious as any that is likely to
arise. The present writer, fortifying his judgment
as he could, has written his book, following the lead
of the scholars most accepted. The numerous foot-
notes will show, he trusts, that he has not been negli-
gent in his reading. However open to question his
conclusions may sometimes appear, they are not, at
any rate, hap-hazard, but referable to respectable
sources.

The writer desires to express his obligation to a
number of helpers. He is indebted to Mr. Goldwin
Smith and to Mr. James Bryce for letters expressing
sympathy with the main idea he has had at heart, —
to illustrate, namely, the substantial identity of the
great English-speaking nations, in stock, and in the
spirit of . their social and political institutions, as
well as in tongue; and the expediency that these
nations should, in John Bright's phrase, become one

X PREFACE.

people. The writer has received such a letter also
from the venerable Sir George Grey of Auckland ,at
different times formerly, governor-general of New
Zealand, of an Australian province, and of South
Africa, and in those high positions so honorably iden-
tified with the rise of an English-speaking world in
the South Pacific. Dr. W. G. Hammond, Dean of
the St. Louis Law School, Hon. Mellen Chamberlain,
late librarian of the Boston Public Library, and Prof.
W. W. FolweU. of the University of Minnesota, have
given the writer the benefit of their criticisms upon
several of his chapters, and helped him to important
books which he could not otherwise have obtained.
To Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., owners of the
copyright of the "Life of Samuel Adams" and "Life
of Young Sir Henry Vane," the writer is under obli-
gation, for permission to quote from earlier work of
his own bearing upon the present subject. Finally,
it must be mentioned that this History of Anglo-
Saxon Freedom has been written at the instance of
Mrs. Mary Hemenway, of Boston, and is to be re-
garded as an outgrowth of the work undertaken by
her to promote good citizenship and love of freedom,
known as the Old South work.

JAMES K. HOSMER.

St. Louis, September 21st, 1890.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
The Peimitivb Saxons.

PAQB

The polity of the United States to some extent a revival of
something most ancient. — The plains at the mouths of the
Elbe and Weser. — Social and legal aspects of the civiliza-
tion of the Anglo-Saxons. — Divisions of rank. — Political
forms. — Comparison of the Anglo-Saxon polity with that
of other primitive Aryan peoples; with that of modern
America. — Freeman and J. R. Green on the retention of
Anglo-Saxon elements in the constitutions of England and
America 1

CHAPTER II.

The Anglo-Saxon Conqtobst of Bkitain.

Inquiry into the value cf Anglo-Saxon freedom. — Views of
John Stuart Mill and J. Toulmin Smith. — Saxon conquest
of Britain. — Transferrence of the continental civilization
to the new home. — Appearance of kingship. — How the
King was appointed. — Origin of the thegns. — Conver-
sion of the Saxons to Christianity. — The Heptarchy. —
The supremacy of Wessex. — Moots of tun, hundred, and
shire. — The witenagemote. — Conservative spirit of Al-
fred. — Influence of the Danes. — The ceorls sink toward
villeinage. — Incipient feudalism. — Edward the Confes-
sor 11

CHAPTER III.

The Battle op Hastings.

Appearance to-day of the field of Senlac. — Importance of
the battle. — The beach at Hastings. — Landing of the Nor-
mans in 1066. — Appearance of Duke William. — His pres-

Xll

CONTENTS.

ence of mind. — Difficult situation of Harold. — Battle Ab-
bey. —The " Koman de Eou." — The two armies opposed.

The minstrel Taillefer. — Dangerous situation of the

Normans. — The wounding of Harold. — The rout of the
Saxons. — A walk to-day over the battle-field .

FAOB

25

CHAPTER IV.

Magna Chakta and the Rise of Parliament.

Submergence of popular government under feudalism. —
Ultimate good effect of the Norman conquest. — Character
of the rule of William I. — Domesday Book. — Persistence
of ancient institutions in tun, hundred, and shire. — Char-
acter of the King's title. — Limitation of feudalism in Eng-
land. — Work of Henry II in depressing the great vassals.

— The Curia Regis. — Serfdom. — Trial by jury. — Acces-
sion of John. — Runnymede. — Analysis of Magna Charta.

— The work of Langton. — The origin of Parliament. —
Value of the representative system. — Conditions of its
success. — Simon de Montfort and his achievement. — Ed-
ward I and the establishment of the House of Commons . 38

CHAPTER V.

The Coming tip of the Serfs.

Condition of freedom in Europe in the thirteenth century. —
Constitution of the early Parliaments. — Importance of
the knights-of-the-shire. — The yeomen. — Unfortunate
state of the boroughs. — The Chapter House at Westmin-
ster. — Division of Parliament into two Houses. — Growth
of the power of Parliament. — Its imperfect character as a
representative body. — Rise of the farmers and the free
laborers. — The Statute of Laborers. — Peasant rebellion.

— John Ball in Kent. — Bearing of Richard II. — Wat Tyler
of Essex. — His death. — Treachery of the King. — Wil-
liam Grindecobbe. — Aristocratic temper of Parliament . 62

CHAPTER VI.

The Times of the Lancastrians.

Deposition of Richard II. — Power of Parliament under
Henry IV. — Popularity of Henry V. — Eortescue on the
English constitution. — Sudden decay of the power of Par-

CONTENTS. xiii

PAGE

liament. — Misfortunes to representation in the shires and
the boroughs. — Jack: Cade's rebellion. — Justice of his
cause. — The Wars of the Roses. — Extinction of the power
of the nobles. — Accession of the Tudor line ... 80

CHAPTER VII.

Depression of the Power of Parliament.

Great increase of the power of the Crown. — Effect of the
Reformation in producing this. — Position and character
of Henry VIII. — Good points of his reign. — Catholic
reaction under Mary. — Wyatt's rebellion. — Parliament
grows more spirited under Elizabeth. — Sir Thomas Smith's
description. — Tact of the Queen — Acts of Suprem-
acy and Uniformity. — Star Chamber and High Commis-
sion Courts. — Absolutism restrained under the Tudors. —
Its triumph everywhere upon the continent. — Growth of
the doctrine of the jus divinum. — Cowell's " Interpreter."

— Subserviency of Convocation and the University of
Oxford. — Claims of James I. — Opposition of Parlia-
ment. — Accession of Charles I. — The Petition of Right.

— Laud, Strafford, and the policy of " Thorough." — Ship-
money 94

CHAPTER VIII.

Settlement of America.

Charters of the East India and Virginia Companies. — Settle-
ment of Jamestown; of Plymouth. — Revival of ancient
Anglo-Saxon polity in New England. — Submergence in
England of the popular moots. — Methods of Puritan set-
tlement in New England. — The town-meeting. — Repro-
duction of contemporary England in Virginia. — The
parish, the county, the court of Quarter Sessions. —
Scene at the county court. — Reasons for the contrast be-
tween New England and Virginia. — The yeoman settlers
of the former. — The great planters, the slaves, the poor
whites of the South. — Disrepute of labor. — Virtues of
The Virginia society. — Spirit of the House of Burgesses.

— Condition of South Carolina ; of Maryland. — Feudalism
in NewYorls and Pennsylvania. — The popular moot the

xiv CONTENTS.

PAGE

primordial cell of Anglo-Saxon freedom. — Its condition in
the Thirteen Colonies, its spirit in New England, its feeble-
ness in the South 110

CHAPTER IX.

The England oi' Chaklbs I.

Effort of Charles to rule without a Parliament. — The Short
Parliament. — Assembling of the Long Parliament. — Its
idea to establish the equilibrium between King, Lords, and
Commons. — Arrest of Laud and Strafford. — The Grand
Remonstrance. — Attempt to arrest the Pive Members. —
Outbreak of the Civil War. — Constitution of the two
parties. — Edgehill. — Low estate of the Parliament. —
The Solemn League and Covenant and Marston Moor. —
Naseby. — The rank and file of the Ironsides. — Their
manifestoes. — Reluctance of the leaders to subscribe to
them. — The prayer-meeting of December 22, 1647 . . 130

CHAPTER X.

The Enclish Commonwealth.

Civil war of 1648. — Siege of Colchester and battle of Pres-
ton. — The Grand Army Remonstrance. — Resistance of
Parliament. — Pride's Purge. — Ireton's declarations. —
The Agreement of the People. — Its anticipation of the
Reform Bill of 1832. — Abolishment of the kingship and
the House of Peers. — Execution of the King. — Republi-
can ideas of the party in power. — Temporary government
of the Rump and the Council of State. — Embarrassments
of the Independents. — Cromwell in Ireland. — The cam-
paigns of Dunbar and Worcester. — The ocean war with
Holland. • — Schism among the Independents. — The dis-
solution of the Rump. — The autocracy of Cromwell. —
Panegyric of Milton. — The Restoration. — Benefits se-
cured by the English Revolution 14g

CHAPTER XL

The Revoltjtion of 1688.

Enthusiasm for Charles II. — Reaction from the ideas of
the Commonwealth. — Benefits flowing from the bad char-

CONTENTS. XV

PAGE

acters of Charles II and James II.— The nation forced
into resistance. — The BiU of Eights and the Eevolution.

— William and Mary. — Extinction of liberty elsewhere. —
Whigs and Tories. — Important part played by the non-
conformists and commercial classes. — The Huguenots and
other refugees. — Doubtful struggle between Whigs and
Tories. — Establishment of modern forms in the polity. —
Rise of the Cabinet. — Unsatisfactory condition of Parlia-
ment. — Power of the nobles and men of wealth . . 163

CHAPTER XII.

Eka op Pakliambntary Cobrttption.

Equal responsibility of Whigs and Tories for parliamentary
corruption. — Stooping of honest men to bribery. — Degen-
eracy of the county representation. — Decline of yeomen.

— Assumptions of the great land-holders. — Bad condi-
tion of the boroughs. — Destruction of the popular fran-
chise. — Rotten boroughs. — • Their growth under the Tu-
dors and Stuarts. — Large towns unrepresented. — Cases
of Buckingham, Bewdley, Oxford, Salisbury, Bath, New
Shoreham, Sudbury. — Condition of Scotland. — Case of
the shire of Bute. — Price of seats in Parliament. — The
" nabobs." — Testimony of Sir Samuel Romilly. — The peo-
ple unrepresented. — Case of Wilkes. — Mass-meetings. —
Rise of the great newspapers. — Dangers to freedom . 177

CHAPTER XIII.

The Coming on of the American Revolution.

Condition of the Thirteen Colonies in the first half of
eighteenth century. — The approach of the American Rev-
olution. — The title to the colonies in the Crown, not in
the Parliament. — Inconsistency of Kings and colonists. —
The ecclesiastical grievance. — The commercial grievance.

— Selfishness of the trading-spirit. — The Sugar Act. —
The rights and privileges of Englishmen. — Effect of the
destruction of French power. — Enforcement of customs
regulations. — The Writs of Assistance. — The Stamp Act.

— Debate in Parliament. — Burke, Chatham, Camden,
Mansfield. — The question summed up. — Superior appre-

-^^i CONTENTS.

PAOB

elation by American statesmen of Anglo-Saxon freedom.

— Leadership of Massachusetts 192

CHAPTER XIV.

The Ameeicak Revolution a Struggle of Parties,
NOT Countries.

Character of George III. — Sympathy of Englishmen with
the American struggle. — A strife on both sides of the
ocean. — Ability and number of pro- American advocates.

— Pear for English liberty if America was conquered. —
Position of Burke. — The masses pro-American. — Strength
of Tories in America. — Their wealth and position. —
Their expatriation. — Pathetic circumstances of their story.

— Victory of the popular party on both sides of the
Atlantic 218

CHAPTER XV.

The Constitution of the United States.

The written Constitution a unique feature of the American
polity. — In England Parliament completely unfettered. —
Importance of the written Constitution. — History of the
idea. — A germ of it in Magna Charta, in guilds of Middle
Ages. — Charters of trading-companies. — Social compact
of the "Mayflower." — Connecticut precedent. — Vane's
" Healing Question." — Convention of 1787. — It proceeds
upon English lines. — Careful retention of Anglo-Saxon
forms. — Contrast between constitution-makers in America
and elsewhere. — Local forms unchanged. — The President
the English King of the eighteenth century. — The Electoral
College borrowed from Holy Roman Empire. — The House
of Representatives compared with the Commons, the Sen-
ate with the House of Lords. — The Supreme Court. —
Influence of Montesquieu's " Esprit des Lois." — Sir Henry
Maine's admiration of the Constitution .... 232

CHAPTER XVL

The New Colonial Empire and the Reform Bill
OF 1832.

French anticipations of England's ruin at close of American
Revolution. — How they were frustrated. — Why Canada

CONTENTS. xvii

PAGE

did not join the United States. — Voyages of Cook. — Dis-
tinctions to be made in the present colonial empire of
Britain. — India, the West Indies, Canada, South Africa,
Australia. — Pitt's agitation of parliamentary reform. —
The "Friends of the People." — General sympathy with
French Revolution in its early stages. — Reaction on ac-
count of the RelgQ of Terror. — Cessation of the reaction
at Waterloo. — Agitation for reform. — Passage of the
Reform Bill of 1832. — Good effects of passage of the bill.

— Present shape of English polity. — England practically
a republic. — Adequacy of the people to their responsi-
bilities, — County Councils of 1888. — Henry George's
scheme of reform. — Flexible and rigid constitutions. —
Pitt's colonial bill of 1791. — Freedom of Greater Britain.

— Colonial Exhibition of 1886. — Extension of Anglo-Saxon
freedom to other countries. — It must be administered by
Anglo-Saxon men 245

CHAPTER XVII.

Present Condition or the American Polity.

Permanence of the Federal Constitution. — Distrust of leg-
islatures as Indicated by the State constitutions. — Condi-
tion of the primordial cell of an Anglo-Saxon polity, the
popular moot. — Examination of rural America. — Local
self-government in New England. — Influences which Im-
pair the character of the town-meeting. — Picture of it
thirty years since. — Tributes to its value. — Settlement
of the West. — Ordinance of 1787. — Local self-govern-
ment in Ohio, Michigan, Illinois. — The Township-County
system of the Northwest. — The County system of the
South. — Virginia continues to be typical of the South, —
The Township-County system the perfect type. — Exam-
ination of urban America. — Growth and mnltipllcatlon
of cities. — Their government the most conspicuous fail-
ure of the United States. — Eagerness to remedy the abuses.
— Views of Hon, Seth Low. — No reason for discourage-
ment 274

xviii CONTENTS.

PAGB

CHAPTER XVIII.

The Future op Anglo-Saxon Freedom.

Predictions of its wide dominance. — Views of J. E. Green,
F. B. Zincke, Gladstone. — Tlie blood of the Englisli-speak-
ing i-ace still pure, though enriched by foreign admix-
ture. — Views of E. A. Freeman, Matthew Arnold, R. A.
Proctor, J. Bryce, Sir Edwin Arnold. — Identity of Eng-
lish-speaking men as illustrated at the Colonial Exhibition
of 1886. — The stock never stronger or better than now. —
The troubles that beset it. — Dangers from intemperance,
licentiousness, neglect of public education. — The French
question in Canada ; fear of the Chinese in Australia ; Home
Rule in England ; in America the negro question, excessive
immigration. — The embarrassments not especially formi-
dable as compared with those of other times . . . 308

CHAPTER XIX.

Do WE RESPECT OUR FREEDOM?

The celebration of April 30th, 1889. — The people's love of
Anglo-Saxon freedom. — Testimony of Andrew Carnegie;
of J. Toulmin Smith. — The American and the German. —
Value in politics of the instinct of the plain people. —
View of J. Bryce, of Lecky, of Addison, of Motley, of
President C. W. Eliot of Harvard. — General confidence
of high and low in our freedom 327

CHAPTER XX.

A Fraternity or BNGMSH-spBAioNGr Men.

The idea of an Anglo-Saxon brotherhood. — Views of J. E.
Seeley, of John Bright, of Sir Henry Parkes, of Sir George
Grey, of J. C. Firth, of the Westminster Review, of
the New Zealand Herald. — Australians especially cordial
to the idea. — IndifiTerence of Americans. — Reasons for
cultivating fraternal feelings among English-speaking
lands. —English readiness to admit and make good past
mistakes. — Sir Edwin Arnold's plan of an International
Council. — Necessity of doing something to prevent Anglo-
Saxon traditions from becoming obscured. — Need to the

CONTENTS. xix

PAGE

world of Anglo-Saxon leadership. — Possible perils from
China; from Russia. — Sketch of Russia. — Threatening
character of her vast development. — Lessing and Goethe
on the virtue of patriotism. — Love for humanity higher
than love of country. — Blessings of unification. — For
the abrogation of national distinctions like must first
seek like. — An Anglo-Saxon fraternity a step toward the
" federation of the world " 343

APPENDIX.

A. Magna Charta. 1215

B. Petition op Right. 1628 ....

C. Bill of Rights. 1688

D. Constitution op the United States. 1787

E. Constitution op Canada, 1867 .

371
383
386
394
399

INDEX 403

" It is a matter of the first consequence that the relation to one
(mother of the two hranches of the English-speaking race should
he more fully understood and realized,"

James Brtce.

' " Tlie new'building has been raised upon tlie old groundwork;
the institutions of one age have always been modelled and formed
from those of the preceding^ and the lineal descent has never been
interrupted or disturbed."

Sir Francis Palgrave : English ConiraonweaUh, I, 6.

ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER I.

THE PRIMITIVE SAXONS.

100 B.C. — 449 A.D.

On the 30th of April, 1789, Washington, as the
first President of the United States, took a solemn
oath to maintain the Federal Constitution. The
Declaration of Independence had been made fourteen
years before ; the Revolutionary War had been fought
through ; the Constitution painfully formulated, and
after the most anxious fears, ratified. The first elec-
tions had been held in due form. The ship of state
had beeif bmlt and launched. One last anxious
moment remained, when, for the first time, steam
was turned into the new machinery. Would the
contrivance work that had been set in order with
such pains? As Washington took the oath, the
pulsations began of the mighty engine whose accom-
plishment through the hundred years need not here
be rehearsed. Government of the people, by the
people, and for the people, went into operation, —
a thing at that time unknown elsewhere among
9ivilized nations.

1

2 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Unknown elsewhere; but had the world never
before seen anything like it? As a polity, it was no
^^ ,., , original device, but a revival of something

The polity of S ' j j-i, "NT ^+1.

America to most ancieut. I once crossed tne iNortn

some extent , , «, i t,j.

the revival Qq„ ^ud comins' upou deck atter a mgJit

of somethiug '-^'^"') o j- _

most ancient. q£ gtorm, f ound the ship entering a great
river, out from which rolled masses of ice. From the
deck a monotonous, far-extending landscape could be
seen, dotted here and there with compact red-roofed
villages. Once landed, it was a journey of many
leagues before the broad plains were left behind, and
we reached a country more picturesque. If, however,
the plains near the mouths of the rivers Weser and
Elbe offer little attraction to the eye, no land is
more interesting through its associations to the mind;
for here lay the primeval home of the Angles and
Saxons, with their kindred, the Jutes, just north, the
remote forefathers of the imperial race which, now
one hundred and twenty millions strong, retains sub-
stantially the language, institutions, and blood of
those ancestors after the lapse of nearly two thousand
years. In the ancient villages we can see distinctly
a life proceeding, in some of its features, Similar to
that of English-speaking men at the present hour.^

The forefathers were not utter savages. Although
fierce fighters, they were at the same time busy fisher-
men and farmers. Though hard drinkers,
legal aspects the sccues within their homes were often

of the civiliza- . , . t n.

tion of the not Without a Simple dignity, as the earl's

Anglo-Saxons. • c • i ,. o J '

Wife with a troop of maidens bore the bowl

1 Tacitns : Germanla, XI. Constitutional Histories of Stubbs, Free-
man, Gneist, Taswell-Langmead, Hannis Taylor, etc. Von Maurer:
Mark-verfassuug. Waitz : Deutsche Verfassungsgesohiclxte, Band I, 4.

PRIMITIVE SAXONS. 3

of ale or mead about the liall while the minstrels
sang.^ They possessed the runic alphabet, and showed
in dress and arms an appreciation of the beautiful.
The freeman in times that soon follow wore a smock-
frock of coarse linen or wool falling to his knees,
identical almost with that of the modern English
ploughman. While it was the common garb of all
classes, it was among those of good station hand-
somely embroidered : about feet and legs were wound
linen bands, parti-colored. In winter, a hood cov-
ered the head, and over the shoulders was thrown a
blue cloak, sometimes fastened by a costly clasp.
For their constant warfare, the coats of ringed mail
that were necessary, the swords scored with mystic
runes while the hilts were finely wrought in silver and
bronze, the helmets with heads of boars, wolves, or
falcons for crests, — all made plain the skill of the
smiths. In the society all the ceorls, or land-owning
freemen, stood equal ; they were bound together in
families in such a way that if one underwent an
injury, all his kin lay under obligation to exact rep-
aration ; as also they lay under obligation to afford
reparation, if one of their number had inflicted the
injury. Each clan occupied its own mark, or village,
a tract held by the occupiers in common. The home-
steads within the tun (the stockade, quickset hedge,
or protecting circle of earth) were held in severalty,

Phillips : Geschichte des Angelsachsisohen Reohts. J. Toulmin Smith :
Local Self-Governmeut and Centralization, p. 29, etc. Johns Hopkins
University Studies, 1st Series, I, II. J. E. Green : History oi the Eng-
lish People, Vol. I, Chap. I. Howard : Introduction to the Local Consti-
tutional History of United States.

1 See J. E. Green's graphic picture at the beginning of the History of
the English People,

4 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

modified, however, by a reservation of public rights ;
but the pasture and forest, stretching far, since wealth
lay largely in flocks and herds, and since a good pro-
vision of wood was necessary for the winter, were
free to all inhabitants. Between the homesteads, on
the one hand, and the pasture and forest, on the other,
was land the tenure of which was intermediate in its
character. Such was the plough-land upon which
each ceorl raised food for his household and cattle,
but was under restrictions imposed by the commu-
nity; such, too, was the meadow, which individuals
owned from early spring to the time of the hay-har-
vest, but which through fall and winter was common
feeding-ground for the swine and kine of all.

As to station, though in a primitive village of the
Angles and Saxons the ceorls formed the most nu-
Divisions of merous class, they by no means comprised
all the people. There were besides the
Icets, in some districts descendants of the race from
whom the soil had been conquered, in other districts
later comers than the Saxons themselves. The Iset
had no individual holding within the tun, and no
share in the common land of the mark. He was
dependent upon some ceorl, was to some extent re-
stricted in his freedom, but at the same time pos-
sessed rights which the ceorl was forced to respect.
Below the laets were the theows, men and women who
were distinctly slaves, — captives in war perhaps, or
persons fallen into this condition through debt or
crime. The theow had no rights, his master having
power over him for life or death : his children were
born slaves ; so, too, the children of a slave mother,
though the father might be free. The theows were

PRIMITIVE SAXONS. 5

probably few in number. As at the bottom of the
Anglo-Saxon social system the slave is found, so at
the top stood the eorl, cetheling, or noble, who, how-
ever, had no station apart from the ceorl. He was
simply the man descended from the first settler, or
the man set apart " because the blood that ran in the
veins of all was believed to run purest in him."^
But no power sustained him in his foremost place,
except a free recognition on the part of his fellows
that it was his due.

In the public life of the tribe the theow had no
part, the Iset little part ; for the ceorl, by virtue of
his possession of the land, held all power. Pouucai
In the centre of the tun was the moot-hill, *°™°'
or perhaps a great tree, where the freemen came to-
gether to deliberate and to govern themselves. Here
was administered the business of the common pasture
and forest ; here the grass-land was portioned out in
the early spring, and the plough-land equably allotted.
In case of a change in the private holding, the seller
handed to the buyer a turf or a twig cut on the ground
in question, in token of the transfer. As time pro-
ceeded, the tie of kinship gave way to the tie of
neighborhood, but the customs did not change. As
to the territory, there remained the individual hold-
ing, the common, and the land held by intermediate
tenure ; as to the people, ceorl, Iset, theow, setheling,
retained each his place. Above all, the moot remained
the centre of life in the mark. It is probable, too,
that here took place, after matters peculiar to the
little community were disposed of, the choosing of

J Sir Henry Maine : Yijlage Coginiimities, p. 145.

6 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the representatives, who were to speak for those who
sent them in the larger moots of the hundred and the
folc.^

For before history begins, a series of moots ranging
upward from the assembly of the mark in ever-widen-
ing comprehensiveness had come to pass. Marks
were gathered into hundreds, districts sending, each,
perhaps, one hundred men to war ; and these again
into the great tribe, or folc. Each division had its
proper moot, the marks appearing probably by their
representatives in the higher moots. On great occa-
sions, and also at stated times, as at the solstice, the
freemen gathered in thousands to the great folc-moot,
dispensing with representation. The priests pro-
claimed silence and maintained order. Speakers
were at liberty to persuade, but no one had power
to command. The nation, which, upon occasion,

1 That representation appeared very early is asserted by the latest
constitutional historians in general, — by none more confidently than
the greatest among them, Bishop Stubbs (Constitutional History, Vol.
I. pp. 44^15, SO-91, 95-96, 102-103, 114-115). There are profound and
accurate scholars, however, who see no adequate proof of it. Dr. W. G.
Hammond finds no suflicient evidence as to the presence of representa-
tives in the shire-moot until after the Norman Conquest, when, accord-
ing to the laws of Henry I, the reeve and four men of the town appear,
if the lord and steward are a^ to remove the liability to fine of the

unrepresented community. Dr. Hammond's views have been given in
lectures in the law-schools of the State universities of Iowa, California,
and Michigan ; also of Boston University and Washington University,
St. Louis. It is to be hoped that they will sometime be accessible to
students in general in book form. My own examination of the passages
in the Anglo-Saxon laws (Schmid: Gesetze der Angel-Sachsen, Lelpsic,
1858) cited by Stubbs in support of his claim, leads me to feel that we
must proceed here with caution. However, the presence of the repre-
sentatives of the tuns in the higlier moots at a very early day is referred
to in this book as a thing probable, — a position amply justified by the
statements of thos? regarded at present as the greatest masters in this
field.

PRIMITIVE SAXONS. 7

became at once a military host, sometimes opposed
by loud shouts, sometimes approved by shaking their
spears, while in vehement moments they clashed to-
gether weapon and shield. No functionary was rec-
ognized, except as he was elected by the national
voice. No one was King, except as his title was
based on the suffrages of the freemen. To lead
armies, certain heretogas, hersogs, dukes, were selected
and commissioned, usually out of the class of Eethe-
lings ; and these, if they became popular and redoubt-
able, had each his gesith, comitatus, a troop of spirited
youths anxious to gain glory and booty, who attached
themselves voluntarily to the successful chief.

If we compare this primitive polity of the Anglo-
Saxons with that of other rude societies of the Aryan
stock, some marked differences may be comiiariBOQ
noted. The power of the people, indeed, Angio-saxon
is no greater than m the olavonic mir, or that of other

IT . T . . P , Aryan peo-

viUage ; than m the communities of the p'es.
early Greeks, as described by Homer ; than in the vil-
age communities of India. Hallam claims that all
races occupying a similar stage of culture possess a
similar liberty.^ As regards the Slavs, however, the
succession of moots above that of the mir is said to
be quite wanting. In the case of the Greeks, no such
recognition of the principle of representation existed,
if we may trust Freeman,^ as that implied by the
sending to the superior assembly of the spokesmen
for the mark. If we look at the village communities
of India, though in many of these a representative

1 Middle Ages, p. 64, Harper's ed. See also G. L. Gomme : English
Village Communities, Chap. I (1890).

3 History of Federal Government, II, p. 67.

8 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

council, standing for all the cultivators,' exercises
the government, nothing is to be found like the folk-
moot, the general meeting of the people.^ Between
the Anglo-Saxons and the Teutons south of them, a
close analogy in institutions undoubtedly existed.
The latter, however, though never conquered by
Rome, became at an early period more or less affected
by the Roman contact, and lost some of the primitive
characteristics. Of all the Germanic tribes, the An-
gles and Saxons were those least touched by the
influences streaming so abundantly and pervasively
from the city of the Seven Hills.

Let us now set side by side ancient Germany and
modern America, the ancient prolific mother and the
compariBon youngcst cMld ; though the points of con-
Saxonfwith trast are marked enough, the points of
institutions, rcscmblance will be found at the same
time numerous and striking. A nation of sixty
millions is vastly different from a tribe of a few thou-
sands ; the elaborate civilization of the nineteenth
century is vastly different from the culture scarcely
raised above barbarism, of the first; the intricate
enginery of peace and war, the cities of iron and
granite, the network of conventionalities by which
we are bound, are far removed from the simple spear
and shield, the palisaded tun, and the artless etiquette
of the hall of the setheling. Here are points, never-
theless, in which we agree with those men of the
past. The first English settlers of America held
their property by similar tenures, traces being by no
means absent of the primeval communal system.^

1 Sir H. Maine : Ancient Village Communities, pp. 124, 154.

2 Johns Hopkins University Studies in History and Political Science,
1st Series, Nos. II, IX, and X.

PRIMITIVE SAXONS. 9

The Indian, descendant of the aboriginal owners of
the soil, without citizenship, yet not a slave, has been
in some times and places probably, no remote analogue
of the Iset; so, too, the indented servant, a class
numerous in the colonial days, who were bound in
service to the freeman, and yet not distinctly servile.
The slave, the counterpart of the ancient theow, we
have had until within twenty-five years. As regards
the setheling, the man in a vague way set apart, likely
to be chosen, if brave and competent, to the office of
heretoga, or war-chief, our society furnishes no trace
of him; on the other hand, the American citizen,
sovereign in all his privileges, is the counterpart of
the ceorl, except that a share in the ownership of land
is no longer a condition of the franchise. In the
definite subordination, moreover, of tun to hundred,
of hundred to shire, and of shire to tribe, we have no
remote foreshadowing of town, county, state, and
federal union. The New England town-meeting is
the moot of the Anglo-Saxon tun, resuscitated with
hardly a circumstance of difference ; ^ as closely par-
allel, perhaps, also are the ancient moots of the shire,
if, they were constituted of the representatives from
each tithing, to the county boards of the Northwest
made up by the supervisors of the different town-
ships.^ Eepresentation, the principle that pervades v
the whole apparatus for law-making and administra- I
tion in the higher ranges of politics, is distinctly /
an Anglo-Saxon idea, proceeding probably from the
earliest times. If America resembles the ancient

I Freeman : Johns Hopkins University Studies, 1st Series, I, p. 38.
" Howard : Introduction to Local Constitutional History of the United
States, I, p. 158.

10 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

mother, in no less degree does England resemble her.
" The voice of sober history does assuredly teach us
that those distant times have really much in common
with our own, much in which we are really nearer
to them than to times which in a mere reckoning of
years are far less distant from us." ^ " AU England,"
says J. R. Green, " lay in that oldest home,
Green on 'the in the viUagc-moot, Parliament ; in the
Ang^o'-saxon glec-mcn, Chaucer and Shakspere ; in pirate-
the constitu- bark, Drake and Nelson." All America lay

tions of Eng- ^

land and jn that oldcst homo no less. The blood and

America.

fibre of the whole great English-speaking
race, in fact, is derived from those Elbe and Weser
plains ; government of the people, by the people, for
the people, which is as the breath of its life wher-
ever that race may be scattered, is the ancient Anglo-
Saxon freedom.

1 Freeman: Growth of English Constitution, p. 158.

CONQUEST OF BRITAIN. 11

CHAPTER II.

THE ANGLO-SAXON CONQUEST OF BRITAIN.

OuE, freedom, then, is no new thing, but developed
from the ancient Anglo-Saxon freedom, something
transmitted from times perhaps prehistoric. We are
to trace its course through nearly two thousand
years, from the German plains to the United States of
to-day. The fluctuations in its history have been
extreme and constant. Many times it has been upon
the verge of extinction. Always, however, it has
been maintained, until at the present hour it ad-
vances to the dominion of the world.

But before entering upon the story of this prog-
ress, let us inquire precisely why Anglo-Saxon
freedom must be regarded as valuable, inquiry into
Precisely why is it that in an intelligent Ang^-Saxon
human society it is better that the people '''=«'^°™-
should govern thenaselves than that they should be
under mastership, either that of a sovereign or a
ruling class, however wise and well disposed ? Since
human nature is what it is, it is quite certain that
in the long run peace and justice between man and
man will be better brought to pass through self-
government, in a civilized state whose citizens are

12 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

fairly self-controlled, than through a monarchy or the
rule of a few. Now and then a King arises of the
highest good sense and the utmost worth. Some-
times a small governing class will show, through a
term of years, unselfishness and solicitous skill in
public business. The beneficent autocrat is sure,
however, to give way sooner or later to some tyrant
—the well-meaning few to a grasping oligarchy. The
masses of mankind can trust no one but themselves
to afford to their welfare a proper oversight. No
one will claim for democratic government that it
is not beset by embarrassments and dangers. Its
course is always through tumults ; its frictions under
the most favorable circumstances cause often pain-
ful jarring and obstruction. But when all is_.said
against it that can be said, it remains true that, for
Anglo-Saxon men, no other government is in the
long run so safe and efficient.

There is, however, a more important consideration
than even this in favor of government of the people.
View of John ^^^ i^Gve I caunot do better than follow
Stuart Mill, ^hc thought of John Stuart Mill. The
best government is that Avhich does most to improve
the people, and that is the government in which the
supreme controlling power in the last resort is vested
in the entire aggregate of the community, — every
citizen not only having a voice in the exercise of
that ultimate sovereignty, but being, at least occa-
sionally, called on to take an actual part in the gov-
ernment by the personal discharge of some public
function, local or general. The superiority of pop-
ular government over every other as to effect upon
character is decided and indisputable. The practice

CONQUEST OF BRITAIN. 13

of the dicastery and ecdesia raised the intellectual
standard of an average Athenian citizen far beyond
anything of which there is any example, either
ancient or modern. A benefit of the same kind is
produced upon Englishmen and Americans, by their
liability to be placed on juries and to serve in town,
district, and parish offices. They are thus made
very different beings in range of ideas and develop-
ment of faculties from those who have done nothing
in their lives but drive a quill or sell goods over a
counter. Still more salutary is the moral part of
the instruction afforded when private citizens take
part in the public functions. They must weigh in-
terests not their own, and be guided by another rule
than their private partialities : they must regard the
general good. Participation, even in the smallest
public function, is useful : such participation should,
however, be great as the general good will allow;
nothing else can be ultimately desirable than the
admission of all to a share in the sovereign power
of the state. Unless substantial mental cultivation
in the mass of mankind is to be a mere vision, this
is the road by which it must come. De Tocqueville
has shown the close connection between the patriot-
ism and intelligence of Americans and their demo-
cratic institutions. No such wide diffusion of the
ideas, tastes, and sentiments of educated minds has
ever been seen elsewhere, or even conceived of as at-
tainable. Nothing quickens and expands like polit-
ical discussion ; but political discussions fly over
the heads of those who have no votes and are not
endeavoring to acquire them. Their position in com-
parison with the electors is that of an au,dience ii^

14 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

a court of justice compared witli the twelve men in
the jury-box.i

To these views of Mill may be added those of
another energetic writer. Popular government af-
fords the only true education. It is not
I'T^uimin schools and colleges that can ever give that
Smith. education. They may be the means of im-

posing cramps and fetters on the mind ; they may dull
out half the faculties by giving undue exercise to
others ; they may drill into a lifeless routine of pro-
prieties and conventionalisms ; they may even impart
what is called refinement and politeness; but they
never are, and never can be, the means of training up
to the great business of life. For that a greater and
wider school is necessary, — the school of the active
exercise of all the faculties in the earnest work of real
life. But the great instrument for drawing forth the
powers of mind and sharpening the wit in every useful'
way will be the free schools of manly discussion and
intercommunication which popular institutions will
keep always open and attended. Both as to thought
and action, the faculties of man will have this as their
best training. Men cannot discuss without first hav-
ing paid some attention to the subject-matter of dis-
cussion. As long as everything is done for them,
they have no occasion to think at all, and vsdll soon
become incapable of thinking. But the moment they
are thrown on their own resources, the moment self-
reliance and self-dependence are made • necessary to
their existence, they wake from their torpor, put forth
their energies, and rouse their faculties. It becomes

1 Considerations respecting Representative Government, American
ed., p. 62, etc.

CONQUEST OF BRITAIN. 15

necessary that they should act; and to act they
should think.i

If, then, Anglo-Saxon freedom is a matter of such
paramount importance, time will be well spent in
tracing its course in history. It has been seen that a
considerable similarity exists among the popular insti-
tutions of the primitive Aryan stocks, a similarity
extending in some degree to savage races in general.
No such development, however, has anywhere else
taken place as that in the case of Anglo-Saxon free-
dom. The English-speaking race is the only race
in which there has been an unbroken institutional
growth from the forest beginnings. " No other soci-
ety," says Macaulay, " has yet succeeded in uniting
revolution with prescription, progress with stability,
the energy of youth with the majesty of immemorial
antiquity." ^

In the conquest of England there was a complete
transfer to the island, of the continental order. Veri-
table war-keels of the times of Hengist
and Horsa have been preserved in the peat- conquest of
bogs of Sleswick, so that an accurate idea
may be formed of the iieets in which was effected this
memorable deportation. They were flat-bottomed, so
that they might be easily beached, seventy feet in
length, eight or nine in width, with sides of oak
planks fastened by bark ropes and iron bolts. Be-
sides the sails, the power of fifty oars forced the
dragon figure-head through the sea. Along the bul-

ij. Toulmin. Smith: Local Self-Government and Centralization,
London, J. Chapman, 1851, p. 50, etc.

2 History of England, Vol. I, p. 20, Harper's ed.

16 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

warks were ranged the war-boards, the round shields
of the crew, of yellow limewood, with an iron boss
in the centre. In the holds of the preserved ships
have been found still lying the weapons and armor
held ready for the landing, — the short seax, at once
dagger and knife; the sword, with its blade rune-
inscribed ; the long spear of ash ; the falcon or boar-
crested helmet. In the effete Roman world upon
the border of which they had lived, scarcely touched
by influences from it either good or bad, the basis of
society was the peasant crushed by deepening fiscal
tyranny into the slave ; the basis of political life was
the hardly less enslaved proprietor, disarmed, bound
like a serf to the soil, powerless to withstand the
greed of the government in which he himself had not
the slightest part.^ The society and polity with
which those rude barks, breasting far and near the
bleak German Ocean, were freighted, was, on the
other hand, that of freemen, brave ceorls, judging,
fighting for themselves ; farmers and herdsmen by
land, by sea the boldest of sailors.

After the foray of Jute, Angle, and Saxon warriors,

wife and child presently followed ; just as distinctly

in the transplantation passed setheling,

of the conti- ccorl, Iset, and slave, who presently set in

zationtothe Order tuu, hundred, and shire, each with

new home. . . , o rm

its appropriate moot.'' ihe movement has

1 J. E. Green : The Making of England, p. 148.

2 It must be noted here that there are scholars who find no evidence
of such a transference of life and institutions from the Elbe and Weser
plains to Britain, at the time of the Anglo-Saxon conquest. Mr. H. C.
Coote in his "Romans of Britain" (London, F. Norgate, 1878), argues
at length, that during the Roman period the greater part of the island
was occupied by the Belgae, who had begun to settle here before the

CONQUEST OF BRITAIN. 17

not the attestation of documents, but, comparing the
account of Tacitus with the reports of annalists who
after an interval appeared, the intermediate history-
becomes plain to us. As before, the land-owning
freemen possessed all substantial power ; the unit of
the political body was the tun-scipe, township ; and
this, whether it was a settlement of kindred coloniz-
ing on their own account, or the estate of some rich
man occupied by a body of dependents, or a neighbor-
hood of small landholders brought to act together
simply from their nearness to each other with no tie
of relationship, possessed a vigorous vitality. In ex-
ceptional cases the reeve of the tun was not elected,
but nominated by the great proprietor ; nevertheless,
in all the tuns the ceorls had their moots with power

time of Csesar. They were Teutons, and to them we owe what we
have called the Anglo-Saxon element in our institutions and language.
When the Anglo-Saxons came, they did not exterminate, but lived
among the Romanized population (the Belgse, namely, who had risen in
civilization under the masters from the Seven Hills), as conquerors and
controllers, though in a far more barbarous condition than their victims.
The institutions and language that prevailed were derived entirely from
these Romanized Belgse : for the Anglo-Saxons were at last all killed
by the Danes. Then the " Roman burgesses " came up, obtaining con-
cessions almost amounting to independence. Through influences pro-
ceeding from them, feudalism was overcome, and a place in the national
council at last won for the Commons, this last achievement being but
the revival of a right which had been possessed under the Roman em-
pire. These ideas, so at variance with the ordinary teaching as regards
early English history, are presented with much learning and ingenuity.
They have made upon the world little impression, however, and since
the death of Mr. Coote, in 1885, they have found no conspicuous
champion. The vast weight of authority remains in favor of the
view stated in the text. Nevertheless, the fact that a theory so utterly
subversive of this view admits of a presentment so plausible, must
cause a feeling that here statements quite too definite may be made, and
that the margin of uncertainty, as regards events in these dark years, is
very large.

18 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

of making their local laws. The hurh, or borough,
was only a more strictly organized tun-scipe, with a
ditch or rampart of earth instead of the hedge or
paling. The hundred, or wapentake, was a union of
townships. These again were collected into divisions
called in the North ridings, in Sussex rapes, in Kent
lathes; the shire at last comprehended all, the chief
officers of which were the shire-reeve, and the ealdor-
man, officials originally elective, but tending, as time
goes forward, to become hereditary .^

The most important change to be noticed, as the
German invaders make their new homes, is that the
Appearance King appears. In some tribes of the Teu-
of kingship. ^.Qjjg there had been in the earliest historic
day a shadowy functionary, in a certain sense an
over-lord through the suffrages of the freemen. The
conquerors of Britain were not among these tribes,
the folk-moot being supreme. Still, in carrjdng on
war, the army-chiefs, heretogas, elected from among
the sethelings by the people, each surrounded by a
personal retinue of warlike youths attracted by his
prowess, headed the military expeditions. As the
necessity for one-man power became pressing in order
to make effective the extraordinary undertakings
upon which the barbarians at length entered, more
and more authority was given to that heretoga who
showed himself valiant and wise, until in chieftains
like Hengist, Horsa, ^lla, and Cerdic, personages
stepped forth among them in a character quite new.
Like the old heretogas, they possessed no authority

1 In the constitutional sketch, Stubbs at present is mainly followed,
with side-lights, however, from a number of oth£r authorities.

CONQUEST OF BRITAIN. 19

but such as was accorded them by their fellow-tribes-
men, though when once constituted they had a power
co-ordinate with that of the folk-moot. They were
chosen usually from families whose blood was thought
purest. Their sway now, however, prevailed in times
of peace as well as war ; or rather, since in the sub-
jugation of the great island war never died out,
though it might have intervals of slumber, their
authority became constant. The principle of hered-
ity began to have more distinct recognition. The
Oyningas, Kings, soon claim descent from Odin,
barbarous people turning readily to the mythical.
The quahties which made a great leader conspicuous
would be likely to be found in his line. Some kins-
man, therefore, by no means necessarily the son, ■ — for
heirs weak.and wicked were for centuries passed over,
— would be chosen to succeed when the great leader
had played his part. The comitatus, too, acquires
in the conquest greater definiteness, com- qj.. .^ ^^ ^^^
posed of youths desiring education in arms, ^^^^''■
unpaid, but accepting entertainment and gifts of
horses and weapons. From these proceeds the class
of thegns, — as regards the King, servants and retain-
ers ; as regards the people, an upper class supplant-
ing the ancient sethelings, — and from the thegns, as
will be presently seen, a memorable development will
one day flow.

In the almost speechless past in which the Anglo-
Saxon conquest is involved, the lispings of history
became at last audible. Pope Gregory at Rome, be-
holding in the slave market, among the captives from
foreign lands, the blonde Angles, finds it possible to
beatify them by so simple a process as the insertion

20 ANGLO-SAXON TKEEDOM.

of a letter.! Augustine accomplishes Ms great con-
conversion of vsrsion. The seething discord of the ear-
slxras^to" li^s* years crystallizes into the Heptarchy,
Christianity, j^^^j ^^ ^]jg Hcptarchy at last, the vigor of
Egbert achieves the supremacy of Wessex. Up to
this time, the beginning of the ninth century, the
church, the two archbishops of Canterbury and York
at the head, has been the only unity among the dis-
tracted English; for so we may now call them. With
the rise of "Wessex comes about a political unity.
Throughout these confused centuries no great change
in institutions takes place, though names are trans-
ferred, and a general consolidation can be noticed.
What in the seventh century was a state becomes, in the
tenth, a shire, while the shire of the seventh century
drops in the tenth into the position of the hundred.
The King, partly elective and partly hereditary, is
at the top; below him the land-owning freemen,
in whose tun-scipes the tie of neighborhood seems
entirely to have replaced the earlier tie of kinship.
The tun-moots are primary assemblies, the moots of
hundred and shire to a considerable extent represen-
tative. A nation has come into existence, far larger,
both as regards territory and numbers, than the Teu-
ton invaders have before known. Since a gather-
ing of freemen into a great folk-moot has become
Thewitcnage- ^'^ loUger possible, in its place is found
"'°'^- the witenag emote, meeting of the wise,'

the witan consisting of the King's wife and sons, the
bishops, the ealdormen of the shires, and a number
of the King's friends and dependents. No formal
denial of the right to be present is ever made as

1 "Nou Angli, aed angeli."

CONQUEST OF BRITAIN. 21

regards the masses of the ceorls, but it comes about
that only the rich and powerful usually appear.^ The
witenagemote inherits much of the power of the
folk-moot, choosing for example the King. Following
the principle of hereditary succession, which is never
set aside except in extraordinary emergencies, the
kingship is restricted to one family, the best qualified
person who stands in close relationship to the last
King being chosen. For ages to come, however, the
acknowledgment or recognition by a crowd of plain
men gathered about the coronation chair, expressed
in some tumultuous way, is never omitted — a more
or less informal but quite essential supplement to the
action of the witan.

In America, to-day, the President once chosen, and
the Upper House with the long term of its members,
form a much-valued counterpoise to the action of the
popular will in the eyes of observers who may be
regarded as impartial.^ So, probably, in the later
Anglo-Saxon constitution, the King and the witan
formed often a salutary counterpoise to the democ-
racy. Radical changes from the ancient ways do
not appear, though new applications of old forms and
methods are not rare. If grave innovations are threat-
ened, some conservative ruler is sure to work of
restore things as nearly as possible to the -*^''''"^-
ancient course. This was notably the case with
Alfred, at the end of the ninth century, whos& great-
ness more than aught else consisted in this, that he
knew the value of the free institutions of his country.

1 Freeman : Growth of the English Constitution, p. 60, etc.

2 Sir H. Maine : Popular Government, article on the American Con-
stitution. Bryce : American Commonwealth, I,

22 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

He sought not to make new laws of his own devising,
" when it was unknown to him what of them would
be liked by those who should come after him," but
gave all his efforts toward the re-invigoration, so far
as circumstances permitted, of the primitive institu-
tions.^

It cost a fierce struggle to maintain this polity
against enemies within, a still fiercer struggle to
maintain it against enemies without. From a station
in the west of England once, as the train paused for
a moment, I looked across a league or more of coun-
try, to where a hill sloped steeply up from the plain.
Standing out against the deep green turf could be
seen in clear outline the white figure of a horse, each
detail remarkably perfect from the distance at which
it was beheld. A thousand years or more had passed
since the surface soil had been scraped away, allowing
the chalk substratum to appear through in the gigan-
tic delineation; for it is said to have been done by
the hands of Alfred's Saxons, victorious close by
over an army of Danes. But the Danes were not
always vanquished, and at last succeeded in seating
upon the English throne princes of their own stock.
Closely allied with the Saxons though they were in
blood, tongue, and institutions, attachment to the
ancient order seems to have been less deeply stamped
Influence of ^^ ^^^^^ grain ; and under their domination
the Danes. ^^y j^g observed the threatening progress
of an innovation which was destined before long to
supersede utterly, to all appearance, Anglo-Saxon
freedom. Each heretoga had had, from the earliest
times, as we have seen, his gesith, or comitatus, the

1 Taswell-Langmead : English Constitutional History, p. 43.

CONQUEST OP BRITAIN. 23

company of warlike youths who followed his banner,
devoting to him their labor and valor, while they
received in return from him entertainment and pro-
tection. In the time of the Danes it became clear
that the gesith was the germ of a growth so porten-
tous as the feudal system. In the wars, at this time
especially sharp, the ceorls were forced to "com-
mend " themselves in great numbers to thegns, receiv-
ing protection in return for service, now with the
ploughshare, now with the spear, in the fitful alter-
nation of peace with strife. Thus the ceorls sank
from the condition of pure freemen and became bound
to soil and lord. The change by no means involved
an entire destruction of their old rights : they retained
their land free as against all men but their lords, and
continued to regulate their own affairs as before in
the moots of tun, hundred, and shire.^ There was a
liability, however, as never before, to interference, a
liability that increased ; for the hour of in(,ipient fg„.
feudalism was at hand. In the time of '*»''™-
Edward the Confessor the air was full of change.
The popular elements of the polity were becoming
more and more depressed ; the great thegns, depend-
ents of the Sovereign, pushed aside or quite super-
seded the ancient setheling ; the witenagemote became
more and more a royal council, to which gathered only
the great officers of the realm. Nevertheless, a rem-
nant of the old order remained. "When the witan had
elected the King, it was not felt that the action was
confirmed until the ring of citizens at Westminster or
Winchester had shouted their acknowledgment about
the coronation chair. At Edward's death, the nation
1 Green : Short History of the English People, p. 245.

24 AKGLO-SAXOJSr FREEDOM.

exercised its sovereign right to choose a ruler to its
mind, passing by the next of kin as inefficient, going
even beyond the royal line, to place the crown on
the brow of Harold. More than all, quite beneath
the surface, as it were, each village-moot discussed
and voted, and from each went forth the repre-
sentatives to speak for their townsmen in the larger
sphere. In dark centuries that were to come, men
often recalled with fondness the laws of Edward
the Confessor, and demanded their restoration. We
reach now an event so important in the history of
Anglo-Saxon freedom that it will be in place to give
it careful consideration.

BATTLE OF HASTINGS. 25

CHAPTER III.
THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS.

There is a little patch of a square mile or so, in
the midst of the rich Sussex landscape in England.
Through it, in low ground, sluggishly p^^.^^.p.
flows a small brook, and from the brook ^-^e'lei^oi
ridges slope up gently on either hand. It teniae
is covered for the most part with the green, thick
English grass, dotted now and then by old elms and
oaks. A gray, half-ruined wall, toothed with battle-
ments at the summit, runs along one verge of the
field ; and there are two or three old towers, forlorn,
through desertion and decrepitude, as Lears, whose
comforting Cordelias are masses of close-clinging ivy,
— wall and towers suggesting a splendor that has
now departed. What happened there in October, 1066,
decided some important things ; for instance, that in
the sentence that is now being written there should
be nineteen words of Saxon origin and four of Latin ;
and that in general, when we write and talk, about a
quarter of our speech should be derived from Rome,
and three-quarters from the German forests. It was
decided there, in fact, that those of us of English
blood are what wc are in mind and body, — a cross,
namely, between two tough stocks, each of which

26 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

contributed precious qualities of brain and brawn to
form a race wbich in tbe nineteenth century should
stand so high. The field is that of Hastings, where
the Normans under William beat the Saxons under
Harold. Thence came a blending of tongues ; thence
a blending of traits — on the one hand enterprise, on
the other sturdy fortitude — into a national character,
too full of spring to break, too hard to be wasted, as
carbon and iron blend together into steel.

One day, at the end of September, I stood on the
beach at Hastings, a watering-place of some fashion
The beach at ou the south coast of England. It was
astingfl. ^ slope covered with rough shingle, close
upon one edge of which crowded the blocks of the
modern town, and on the other, the waters of the
English Channel. On the summit of a high cliff to
the eastward was the ruin of a Norman castle — cliff
and ruin so in sympathy through a long community
of stormy exposure, that the turf and rock of the
downs seemed to rise into the moss and masonry with
scarcely a perceptible dividing line. In front lay in
the motionless air the wide glassy level of the Chan-
nel, with the horizon line blotted out by the afternoon
haze. Coasters lay at anchor off the beach, somewhat
dim, with their sails hanging slack. There was a
sound of oars from pleasure-boats, and as I stood on
the beach, the sailors came up and pressed me to row
with them. Close by, among the many promenaders,
a Sunday-school from an interior village was holding
a picnic. A day or two before, — it was in 1870, —
the Prince Imperial from France, with the Empress,
just driven from Paris, had landed in Hastings from
Normandy in great distress. Mother and son were

BATTLE OF HASTINGS. 27

still in the town, and not improbably among tbe
groups on the beach.

It was in a different way that a prince from France
landed at the same spot eight hundred years ago.
Had I stood then on the shore looking
southward through precisely such Septem- the Normans
ber mist upon a motionless sea, I should
have seen countless sails floating up in the offing ;
and, in the front of the fleet, an ornamented bark,
with a great cross on its flag, a sail marked with a
coat of arms of three lions, and on the prow a brazen
child holding an arrow and a bow bent to shoot.
The chronicler, William of Malmesbury, says the
sails of the vessel were crimson. These were kept
turned to the wind and aided by oars until finally the
keel grated upon the shore ; and the multitude of
craft that followed, bringing sixty thousand men,
ranging eastward and westward for miles on either
hand, were beached one after another by their crews
in a similar manner. Over their sides instantly sprang
a multitude of archers ; then of knights ; then from
the holds of the ships were led the horses, full of
mettle from their long confinement, which pranced on
the sand and filled the air with their neighing. Lastly,
on the ship whose prow bore the brazen
child, a tall, strong man approached the ofDukewu-
side. His hair and beard were light, his
face florid. It had power and decision, bespeaking a
character fearless, enterprising, cruel. As he leaped
down in his armor from the low vessel upon the wet
sand, his foot slipped, and he fell forward upon his
two hands. The thousands watching him from the
decks of the vessels and from the beach sent up at

28 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

once a cry of distress ; for it was taken as a sign of
evil omen. Several of tlie chroniclers say it was a
knight standing by who gave a favorable turn to the
incident by a sudden explanation ; but I like best the
account of Wace, in the fine old " Roman de Rou,"
whose father was a soldier in that host, and had, no
doubt, told the whole story to the son. It is that the
strong warrior sprang up vigorously, and holding on
high his dripping hands full of wet sand : " See, my
lords," he cried, "by the splendor of God, I have
taken possession of England with both my hands.
It is now mine, and what is mine is yours." It was
Duke William of Normandy. How he and his fol-
lowers looked, with their kite-shaped shields, their
helmets with the " nasals " projecting down from
the front, their chain-armor, their boots of steel or
strips of variegated cloth wound about the leg from
knee to ankle, — all this we know from the Bayeux
tapestry. What they said and did was rehearsed at
length by many a patient monk, and far more pic-
turesquely by the minstrels, who told the tale to the
sound of the harp many generations after, to King and
noble. The Saxon King, Harold, was

Difficult situ- °

ation of Ear- besct With cuemies. He overthrew in the

old.

north a rival claimant ; but it was at that
very time that the crimson sail came leading the
Norman fleet from the southward, when the Saxons,
though victorious, were weakened and disorganized.
Harold, however, hurried to meet the new enemy,
leaving behind, in his impetuosity, all the strength of
the northern counties. He made a hasty levy of
forces in London and in the south, and came swiftly
towards the coast, hoping to take William by surprise,

BATTLE OF HASTINGS. 29

Finding the hope vain, he drew up his army a few
miles from the shore and waited for the Norman
onset.

Turning from the calm sea and the beach which
those historic keels had grated, I followed back on
William's track to the scene of the engagement. I
rode through farms and handsome estates where there
was nothing to suggest what filled my own thoughts
but the name of the station at which I finally alighted,
— Battle. Thence I walked into the High Street of
the little town, whose existence dates back even to
the great day, when it was called Senlac. Each
receding century had left its wave-mark on the little
ridge where ran the principal street. The railroad
depot was a wrinkle which to-day had made, and
going from thence there were waifs deposited now
by one time and now by another. There was a por-
tico on which beaux of George the Fourth's time
might have stood in surtouts and high stocks; old
thatched roofs, with house-leek green among the
weather-beaten mass, that came from a hundred years
back ; projecting upper stories from Cromwell's day.
Close to the church I got glimpses of a lovely vicar-
age, withdrawn into quiet, whose shadow-dappled
front had the elaborate gables and oriel windows
above and below that marked it as Elizabethan, and
the church itself was partly at least, from the Wars
of the Koses. But at the end of the street rose a
structure so massive and venerable that it subordi-
nated to itseK the whole of the little vil-

Battle Abbey.

lape. It was two-storied, guarded at the

ends by solid turrets, and battlemented at the top. In

the centre was a broad, low-arched gate, above which

30 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the front rose sixty feet into a huge square tower.
The side of the gateway was sculptured with the
heads of Norman kings and queens. Everywhere
over the front the weather had eaten into the bro.wn
stone, so that it was marked and crow's-footed as an
old man's face. There was no decrepitude, however,
but the halest old age. I went up to a narrow open
door close by the broader portal. I found the masonry
was many feet in thickness, and the doorstep firm
and serviceable, though deeply grooved by foot-beats.
From the dim room beyond, lit by slits in the thick
wall, a woman came forward to answer my inquiries.
It was the gateway of famous Battle Abbey, built by
William to commemorate the victory on the spot
where he won it. Following the direction, I turned
out of the High Street into a footpath, skirted the
enclosure of a park, with a ravine to the right which
once was full of wounded Saxons, and came out at
last upon more open ground — a ridge of greensward,
with now and then a tree, the ground from which
descended to a little brook, then rose again into an
answering ridge. The whole was traversed here and
there by hedges , there were stacks about farm-
houses ; sometimes the brown thatch of cottages ; to
the left, the irregular line of the ruined abbey, with
the fresher buildings of a nobleman's seat — all sweet
under the subdued light of the autumn afternoon.
I stood on the spot occupied by Harold's vanguard,
the men of Kent.

I counsel all who make a pilgrimage to Hastings
to take as a guide for the battle-field the old " Roman
The Roman '^^ Rou," either the translation, or, still
cieKou. better, the original Norman-French, as

BATTLE OF HASTINGS. 31

Xhierry gives it in an appendix.^ A little previous
study will make it intelligible enough to a reader of
ordinary French ; and if it is crossed now and then
by an obscurity, the fine chivalric picture is hardly
injured. It is like the fierce beauty of a knight's
face suggesting itself through helmet-bars ; and the
prompt iambics of the metre strike the ear with a
vigorous music, like the rhythmic hoof-beat of a troop
ranging for a charge. I could easily trace from point
to point the progress of the battle. Right from my
position had the handsome King, the idol of his peo-
ple, run his simple entrenchment, — a line of stakes
between which osiers were twisted. This marked the
front of the position ; and about the knoll to the left,
a stronger and higher enclosure of the same sort
seems to have been made for the protection of the
Saxon standard, — the figure of a fighting man em-
broidered upon a banner and richly set with The two ar-
gems and gold. The Norman monk. Or- '°'«' "pp"'^^-
dericus Vitalis, while condemning Harold as cruel and
perjured, shows him in attractive colors. He had a fine
mind and ready eloquence, was intrepid and courteous,
stalwart in figure, and of great strength. He appears
in the Bayeux tapestry in a tunic of iron rings, and
protably on the battle day wore his crown upon his
helmet, as was the custom of Kings of his race. The
banner shone and sparkled above a strong, yellow-
haired host, among whose weapons the two-handed
axe was conspicuous. Their shields were round,
with a boss in the centre. Probablj^, since the levies
came in hastily at the King's call, some wore the

1 Creasy gives much of it in the " Fifteen Decisive Battles of the
World."

32 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ancient picturesque Saxon armor, described by Sir
Samuel Meyrick,i heirlooms from warriors who had
fought against the Danes, — plates of tough, hard
leather overlying one another on a long-skirted tunic,
leaf-shaped and stained variously, brown, orange, or
scarlet, so that the men must have seemed to have
clothed themselves from the October woods that were
gorgeous about them. Raising my eyes and glancing
across to the opposite slope, I tried to call up a vision
of the Norman columns, troops of horsemen in steel,
with front and flanks guarded by archers and pike-
men in quilted coats or girt about with hides. I
thought I could nearly fix the spot where the duke,
putting on his hauberk, threw it over his shoulder, the
back side in front. Those who stood near were sorely
alarmed at the bad omen, as at the landing ; but the
ready leader changed it in an instant, crying out:
" The hauberk which was turned wrong by me and
then set right signifies that a change will take place
out of the matter which is now stirring. We shall
see the name of duke changed to King." The duke
then mounted his Spanish charger and careered before
his retinue, who burst forth into impetuous tribute
to his strength and prowess.

Down the slope there, at nine o'clock, moved the
Norman lines. But the page of battle about to be
written in blood was illuminated at its edge with pic-
The minstrel turesquc poctry. The minstrel Taillefer,
Taiiiefcr. having begged the boon of William, sud-
denly spurred forward to within a few paces of the
waiting Saxons, pausing, I conjectured, a few rods
down the slope from where I sat. There he sang the
1 Antient Armour, I, p. liiii, introduction.

BATTLE OF HASTINGS. 33

song of Roland and the peers of Charlemagne, engag-
ing meantime in single combats, until at length he
fell under a lance-thrust. Says the "Roman de
Rou": —

" Taillefer, ki mult bien cantout,
Sor un dieval ki tost alout,
Devant li dus alout cantant
De Karlemaine e de RoUant,
E d'Oliver e des vassals
Ki morurent en Renohevals.

Sires, dist Taillefer, mierci,
Jo vos ai lungement servi ;

^ T^ v^ y^

Otreiz mei, ke jo n'i faille,
Li primier colp de la bataille."

The battle now began with the utmost fierceness.
Over the slopes the trumpets rang, the tramp of the
horses resounded hollow on the earth, the shields
echoed, struck by swords and maces. Like swarms
of migrating wild fowl, the feathered arrows of the
archers sounded through the air, which they dark^
ened by their number. The Normans shouted their
war-cry, " God aid us ! " The Saxons clamored in
return, " Out, out, Holy Cross ! God Almighty ! " The
" Roman de Rou " is here most pleasantly quaint : —

'"Olicrosse, 'sovent crioent ;
E'Godemite, 'reclamoent ;
'Olicrosse, 'est en engleiz
Ke Sainte Croix est en franoeiz,
E'Godemite, 'altretant
Com en franoeiz Dex tot poissant."

34 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

The wicker-work, which with modern arms would
be so feeble a barrier, was to the Normans a most for-
midable obstacle. From nine o'clock until
Sfuation°of noon there was no advantage on either side,
the Normans, rj,^^^^ howevor, a troop of Brctons under
Eustace, Count of Boulogne, which had been specially-
engaged, fell back before the Saxons in almost utter
rout. In the low ground, his followers became in-
volved in ditches and in the brook, and perished by
the hundred. Utter defeat seemed to lie before the
invaders. Bishop Odo of Bayeux, William's brother,
with a white ecclesiastical dress sweeping about his
stately figure, but wearing a hauberk as well and with
a mace swinging at his wrist, dashed on a white horse
into the confusion, crying, " Stand fast ! " William,
too, who had been supposed to be slain, flung his
helmet from him, and with head bare, stopped the
flight. " I am here ! " he cried. " Look at me ; I live,
and will conquer ! " Throughout the afternoon the
clang of the conflict was unabated. Somewhere
toward four o'clock, it is probable, took place the event
which was the beginning of the end. William, observ-
ing that the shafts of the archers, shot horizontally,
stuck in the osiers and did little harm, ordered that
they should be shot upward, that they might descend
vertically upon the heads of the Saxons. Aloft flew
Harold *^^ arrows. Harold, looking up unwarily,

wounded. received one in his left eye. Blinded, and
crazed with pain, he drew it out, and leaned exhausted
upon his shield. Just here the Normans practised a
stratagem with results to them most fortunate. Their
horsemen feigned a retreat in great confusion into
the low ground, leaving their archers behind them.

BATTLE OF HASTINGS. 36

The Saxons, unrestrained now that Harold was
wounded, rushed down the hill in disorderly pursuit,
— "like sand without lime," is the graphic phrase of
Matthew of Westminster. At a signal from William,
the knights returned on the gallop and swept round
them; then, fighting backward, Norman and Saxon
entered the entrenchment together.

The closing scenes are made sadly vivid in the old
tales. The men of Kent who survived, and the levies
of Essex and Sussex collected with the T^g^o^t^f
bleeding Harold at the foot of the gleam- *•>» s*^""'-
ing standard. Covered with sweat and blood, they
shouted cries of defiance that the Normans compared
to the barking of dogs. But the knights came charg-
ing, William at the head fighting like a common man-
at-arms. The sun had sunk below the level of the
woods. Twenty Norman knights, devoting themselves
to death or victory, made their way to the standard's
foot. The blinded King struck wildly at his foes;
but a blow on the helmet felled him, and the sword
of a knight cut his thigh through to the bone. In
the twilight the last resistance was beaten down,
and a group of exhausted men stood with uncertain
footing upon the heap of corpses. The standard of
the dead Harold fell, and that of William took its
place.

"Then the duke took off his armor, and the
Barons and knights came, when he had unstrung his
shield, and took the helmet from his head and the
hauberk from his back, and saw the heavy blows
upon his shield and how his helmet was dinted in,
and all greatly wondered, and said: 'Such a Baron
never bestrode war-horse, nor dealt such blows, nor

36 ANGLO-SAXON f^REEDOM.

did such feats of arms; neither has there been on
earth such a knight since Roland and Oliver.' And
the duke stood meanwhile among them, of noble
stature and mien, and rendered thanks to the King
of Glory through whom he had the victory, and he
ate and drank among the dead, and slept that night
upon the field."

William was fierce as the lions which he had
chosen for his escutcheon ; but there is a superb
strength in the historic figure. He had begun to take
on some superficial refinement and accomplishment,
just as upon the steel of his armor were embossed
some few lines of ornament — a fine type of the Norse
barbarian, whose tumultuous forces were beginning
to be steadied and calmed for the ruling of the world.
No doubt he was a sad scourge to his new domain ;
and yet it is not slight praise which our infant history
accords him, pleasantly lisping in the Anglo-Saxon
chronicle : " Man mihte faran ofer his rice mid his
bosme fuUum goldes ungedered " ( " One might go
through his kingdom full of gold unharmed ") ; and
a passing flush of genial poetry burns momentarily
in the dry, meagre record in the passage : " He loved
the tall deer as if he were their father."

This is the story whose outline I read on the ridge,
sitting where waited the Kentish vanguard for the
Norman charge. I went slowly down the
ov^thebat^'' hill in the track of Eustace and his routed
troops to the spot where they were massa-
cred. Centuries after, in wet weather, the brook
was believed to flow with a reddish tinge, remember-
ing the ancient slaughter. As I saw it, its bed
was nearly dry, and in it grew osiers, descendants,

BATTLE OF HASTINGS. 37

perhaps, of slips that were woven into Harold's
entrenchment, as I pleased myself with fancying I
might be a descendant of a tattooed ceorl of Kent
that stood sheltered behind them. It must have
been just here that Odo, the bishop, rode forward
with his mace; and here that the Spanish charger
pranced in the morning, and the eager Barons burst
out rapturously over their leader's beauty and man-
hood. The gray ruin of the abbey now lay opposite;
among constructions of a more recent date, a broken
wall, an ivy-covered turret, a mouldering gable
pierced here and there with the rounded Norman
arch. It was just there, where within the wall a rem-
nant of the high altar yet remains, that the gems
and gold of the Saxon standard flashed over the
combat. That night there was scarcely a soul in
sight. Lovely upon the trees, here and there yellow
and scarlet, where the autumn was even then kin-
dling, was the sunlight through the haze. The quiet
fields sloped smoothly to the brook, welted down to
the hillsides by the long hedges, and bossy with oaks
and elms. The old battle-field was indeed at peace.
Riding back to London in the dusk, I found myself
imagining that the rounding of the hills, the wide
moor, the patches of woodland, might be somewhat
as they were when out from all this country the faith-
ful levies came gathering to Harold's side. Old oaks
were in the fields, which possibly may even then have
been standing; or whose parent acorns, at least,
dropped from branches beneath whose shade, as the
King rushed too hotly southward, tired footmen
might have- fallen out to rest their blistered feet.

88 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER IV.

MAGNA CHARTA AND THE RISE OF PARLIAMENT.

William t, 1066. Stephen, 1135. John, 1199.

William U, 1087. Henry n, 1154. Henry III, 1216.

Henry 1, 1100. Richard 1, 1189. Edward 1, 1272.

The ancient popular government underwent a great
submergence througli the Normans. These invaders,

originally Scandinavian rovers, and prob-
rfp^pnfar'"'^ ably then scarcely, if at all, distinguish-
toougneu- able from the Danes, so long the scourge

of England, had been in contact with the
Franks, a German tribe, which after having con-
quered the Eomanized Gauls, had undergone through
the vanquished very considerable modification, blend-
ing with them into one people, assuming their lan-
guage and many of their institutions. The Franks,
in their turn, had wrought with a curious power,
during a century and a half, upon the followers of
Rolf the Ganger, the successful freebooter to whom
had been ceded Northwestern France, until in 1066
William and his followers had accepted the tongue
and customs of those who had been subdued. The
Frankish polity, adopted by the Normans, had early
shown, even before the emigrations from Germany,
a difference from that of the Saxons. In the former
the authority of the King was at first a well-marked
feature, for which, in the case of the latter, must be

MAGNA CHARTA. 39

supplied, as we have seen, the rule of the elected here-
togas, or of the folk-moot ; but as time proceeds, the
authority of the King among the Franks diminishes.
Feudalism (plain signs of which, developed from the
ancient institution of the comitatus, are traceable in
Saxon England, particularly under the rule of the
Danish Kings), had received among the Franks a
much more thorough development. The great vassals
almost equalled the King.

The Roman custom of granting lands to be held
by tenure of military service, combined with the Teu-
tonic comitatus to produce Frankish feudalism. But
feudalism never prevailed in England to the extent
that it did upon the continent ; the Kings managed,
except for one reign, to keep great power in their
own hands, and were not overawed by vassals.

Although causing such woe to the vanquished, and
overlying so thoroughly for the time being Anglo-
Saxon freedom, the effect of the Norman uiumate good
conquest, viewed in the historic perspec- m*°coI''^'"'
tive, was only good. It created in Eng- i"**'-
land a sense of unity which before had been lacking.
By mingling their strain with that of the English,
the Normans added fire and vigor to the stock. So
far as they remained distinctly Norman, they pro-
voked and stimulated the energies of the vanquished,
even by their opposition and oppression. Before
leaving Normandy, William had ruled his

° •' . ■ 1 1 Character of

people as a personal sovereign, with the wmiam's
advice and consent of a council of great
Barons who stood to him in a feudal relation. The
mass of the people were cultivators, living in strict
dependence upon the lords, to whose standards they

40 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

might at any moment be rallied, either for defence
or the foray, now and then remembering something
of the ancient Teutonic freedom, but with nothing at
aU corresponding to the vigorous folk moot, the self-
government which the Anglo-Saxons had maintained.
The vassal must serve the lord ; the lord must pro-
tect and also judge the vassal.

To an observer studying the period superficially, it
would seem that popular freedom gives no trace of
itself for one hundred and fifty years, until in the
exaction of Magna Charta took place a memorable
outburst of the ancient spirit. That, however, was
by no means unprepared, and we have now briefly to
trace the indications of a free life that persisted un-
crushed beneath the superincumbent mass that had
overwhelmed it. To all appearance, indeed, nothing
could be more arbitrary than William's rule. He
became the supreme landlord of the kingdom. All
the common land of the nation became his absolutely;
and all land which had been appropriated, it was
necessary now to hold from him mediately, if not
immediately, for between him and the mass of the
people, rank stood beneath rank in the feudal subor-
dination. In place of the countless free-holders of
the former time came fifteen hundred tenants-in-chief,
on the one hand owning the suzerainty of the King,
on the other hand exacting from liege-men, grade
Domesday bclow grade, tribute and homage. In a
Book. quiet room in Fetter Lane in London, in

the Public Record Office, where are preserved the
archives of England, one may see to-day the famous
Domesday Book, in which the clerks of William
made the record of the great survey and division by

MAGNA CHARTA. 41

wMoh this vast re-appropriation of England was ac-
complished. The attendant takes it for you out of
its case of silver and glass, a massive volume, the
inscription upon whose parchment leaves is as hand-
some and vivid as when the eyes of the Conqueror
passed down the lines, to see that all was in order.
As you behold it, an awe strikes you ; for it is the
very foundation of England, in one sense, upon which
your eyes are fastened. Thousands of the conquered,
dispossessed, fled northward to the Scottish lowlands ;
thousands more, once free ceorls, sank to the condi-
tion of villeins and serfs ; while the remnant that suf-
fered less, were still in every way humiliated, in the
grasp of the rapacious and insolent horde who had
fought with William at Senlac.

Nevertheless, a careful eye to-day will see that
William disturbed as little as he could the ancient
customs. At his coronation, he scrupulously observed
the ancient Saxon usage. He was elected at West-
minster by the witan, and accepted afterward by the
concourse of people, ^ — the form which had come to
stand in place of the national recognition.
The moots of shire, hundred, and tun re- andem insti-

. tutioDB in tun,

tained somethmsf of their former power, hundred, and
In a dim way the oppressed people felt
that the King was a well-wisher to them, at any rate
as compared with his lords, the hated masters with
whom they were immediately in contact; and the
King could rely on the bulk of the people in all
struggles with the great vassals, in spite of feudal
obligations to the immediate suzerains. The Anglo-
Saxon system had been strongest in the cohesion of
its lower organism, the association of individuals in

42 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the township, wapentake, and shire ; the Norman
system was strongest in the higher ranges, in the
close relation of the sovereign to the tenants-in-chief.
When the latter system was superimposed upon the
former, the best elements of both were brought to-
gether, the weaker in each case disappearing. The
dumb life of the Norman masses was superseded by
the vigorous local self-government of the popular
moots, with their constant, tumultuous, character-
forming discussion. On the other hand, the somewhat
shadowy Saxon King, doubtfully more powerful than
his great earls, gave way to the Norman monarch,
supreme above the strongest baron, who owed him
definite allegiance.^

William Rufus, Henry I, and Stephen, the two
sons and grandson of the Conqueror, constitute, with

the great leader of the line, the Norman
the King's dynasty. With them the claim to rule is

by no means the jus divinum, the divine
right. If the Kings could have succeeded by the law
of inheritance solely, liberty would, no doubt, have
perished; but the election at the coronation in the
case of each was carefully observed. It appeared,
perhaps, to be a mere perfunctory ceremony, but it
had by no means lost all of its earlier real importance.
With the election, took place the formal acceptance
by a crowd gathered from the neighborhood, who
stood for the people. The oath to govern well was
taken, and a solemn promise made to observe ancient
ways. It all formed an important acknowledgment
of the rights of the nation and a recognition of the
duties of the sovereign. The power to elect and

1 Stubbs : Constitutional History, I, p. 278.

MAGNA CHAKTA. 43

approve implied at the same time a power to depose ;
and the fact that there were in every case others
who, by blood, were as near the throne as the actual
occupant, kept this power always in mind. The
right of inheritance was held to be co-ordinate with
election; the witenagemote remained substantially
as before the conquest; no trace existed there of a
representation of -the free-holders in general; but
though not yet traceable in the central council, rep-
resentation was familiar enough in the lower courts.

In thoroughly developed feudalism, the King,
though at the top of the structure, is scarcely more
powerful than his great vassals. Against
this danger both sons of the Conqueror ofTeudaiism
were forced to struggle, finding means to
resist in the help of the people, which help, the Kings,
in the midst of their oppressions, were forced to pay
back by acts of grace. William Rufus testified to the
nation that he had duties and they had rights. Henry I
promised peace and good coinage, and restored the
working of the lower moots as in the days of the
Confessor. In the time of Stephen, feudalism had its
way. His great liegemen, entrenched in their castles
with which all England began to bristle, contested
the authority of the suzerain, while they ground the
people below them into the dust. The misery of the
land, though so cruel, was yet in the end beneficent ;
it was so intolerable that something better must come
perforce. The great Henry II, first of the
Plantagenet Kings (1154-1189), disarmed presseBthe

° , , . great vassala.

the feudal party, destroyed their strong-
holds, banished the mercenaries with whom the lords
had confronted the Sovereign, and showed an inten-

44 ANGLO-SAXOK FREEDOM.

tion of ruling by means of, if not under the control
of, the national council. He brought it about that
juries of twelve men of the hundred and four men of
the township should present before the justice all
persons accused of felony by popular report; thus
the people were distinctly recognized, and an impor-
tant training prepared through which they became
fitted for work that was to come for them in better
days that were approaching.

The Curia Regis, the King's Court, must by no
means escape our notice. Through this was exer-
The Curia cised the judicial power of the King. The
Regis. justices, wliilc at work in the provinces,

sat in the shire-moot, in which, besides the local mag-
nates, sat also the reeve and four men and the parish
priest from each township, after the venerable custom.
The Parliament, the upspringing of which we shall
have presently to study, was, when it came, a combi-
nation of local representatives with the council of
great men of the land. It was no short step toward
that when the Curia Regis and the shire-moot came
together. The shire-moot had undergone no change,
but was held "as in King Edward's day, and not
otherwise." Twice a year it assembled, the lords of
the land and their stewards appearing on the one hand,
and the representatives of hundreds and townships, on
the other. The ancient tun-scipes, to be sure, were
now called manors, and were held by lords infeoffed
by feudal grant. Of these manors, there were 1422
in the ancient demesne of the crown. But their courts
baron were the primitive moots, the units of the
ancient Anglo-Saxon polity. Multitudes of the free-
holders had been depressed into villeinage, their chil-
dren inheriting the debased station.

MAGNA CHARTA. 45

Different grades can be made out obscurely among
these dependents, — liberi homines, sokemen, cotarii,
bordarii, and thrall; but the Norman lord
was disposed to depress all into one class,
— that of serfs, bound to the soil, and under obligation
to render service. Nevertheless, the primitive funda-
mental-organization was not obliterated. Towns now
were growing rich and important, and at this time
preserved the traditions of Teutonic liberty more per-
fectly than the shires ; for the burgesses, in the case
of the larger ones, had a moot answering to the shire-
moot, and also a moot of the ward answering to that
of the hundred or wapentake. In the case of smaller
boroughs scattered through the provinces, the consti-
tution was that of the hundred rather than the town-
ship. The condition of the serf was not utterly with-
out hope; for if he could but obtain admission into
a merchant-guild or club, and remain for a year and a
day unclaimed by his lord, he was free. The
practice of trial by jury strengthened now
the impulse toward freedom. Stubbs derives it from
the Franks, with, perhaps, some distant relationship
to the Roman law. Though introduced at the con-
quest, it does not, until Henry II, become a settled
institution. Henceforth, however, there lay upon
every common man the liability to act as a judge,
even in cases of life and death. To do such service
fell within each man's experience, — perhaps to do it
many times. How salutary the discipline, even though
the wisest decision may not be always reached !

The ancient freedom, therefore, was by no means
dead beneath its superincumbent burden, but simply

46 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

oppressed and hidden. It needs no long searcliing to
find it in the days when feudalism was heaviest, and
in the great thirteenth century, at the first opportunity
it gives plain manifestation of itself. With the last
AccesBion of J^^^ ^^ *^^ twelfth centuTy we reach the
John. important reign of John, which was ush-

ered in by a circumstance full of good omen. At
the coronation, the Archbishop of Canterbury, as if
the neglect of duty and rapacity of Richard I had
shown the need of a reassertion of the ancient safe-
guards, declared that the right to reign comes to no
man by birth, but is conferred by election, which the
nation makes after invoking the Holy Ghost. On
the 4th of August, 1213, a national council took place
at St. Albans, to assess damages done to the church,
in which not merely bishops and barons were present,
but each township on the royal demesne sent its rep-
resentatives, the traditional reeve and four men.
Here, for the first time, we have historical proof of
the summoning of representatives in any shape to the
national council. It was, without doubt, intended
that they should appear merely as witnesses ; but it
was important. For the last two or three reigns the
divided nation had been growing together. French
and Anglo-Saxon were blending fast into one speech ;
conquerors and conquered were becoming mutually
interfused with one another's blood; community of
perils and interests was bringing about an interchange
of sympathy. At last, with the loss of Normandy,
the circumstance ceased to exercise an influence
which till now had caused the conquering race to
feel a divided patriotism. Like the conquered, they
were to have no land henceforth but England, and

MAGNA CHARTA. 47

high and low extended hands to one another as had
not been done before. We reach at length the 15th
of June, 1215.

Whoever stands on the great round tower of
Windsor Castle, has under his eyes one of the most
interesting landscapes of the world. The
fairest part of England is spread out under ^"""y""^"-
his feet, through which winds the Thames eastward to
where, on the horizon's edge, the bank of cloud and
smoke marks the site of London. Not a point of the
view but causes a thrill through great associations.
The old tower here marks the chiirchyard of Stoke-
Pogis, where Gray wrote his Elegy. The group of
buildings close at hand are Eton school, where, for
four hundred years, the privileged boys of England
have taken their start as they grew up, so many of
them, into great historic figures. The landmark
yonder stands on a field once bloody, where the Red
and White Roses clashed. The chapel at your feet
holds the tombs of Tudors, of Stuarts, and of the
house of Brunswick. There is no spot, however, in
the wide prospect, upon which the eyes of thoughtful
men are likely to rest longer, than a patch of bright
green grass, seen among the darker foliage of a forest,
at the distance of a league or so, — a spot which still
bears the name of Runnymede. Here the tyrant
John was forced to meet his Barons and grant to
them Magna Charta. To extort it was " the first act
of the united nation, — the Church, the Barons, and
the Commons, for the first time thoroughly at one.
It is in form only the act of the King ; in substance
and historical position, it is the first effort of a corpo-
rate life that has reached its full consciousness, re-

48 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

solved to act for itself, and able to carry out the
resolution. The whole constitutional history of
England is little more than a commentary on Magna
Charta." i

The Great Charter ^ contains a summing up of the
rights and duties that had been growing into recog-
Auaiysis of uitiou, whilc the nation was growing into
MagnaChaita. consciousuess. The Commons are joined
with the Barons in the execution of the Charter, and
now, for the first time since the overturn of the old
order, take part in the great life of the nation. It is
in the form of a royal grant, but is really a treaty,
which John had no idea of keeping, between him and
his subjects, based on a series of articles drawn up by
them. The Barons maintain the right of the whole
people as against themselves as well as against the
King. The rights of common men are as carefully
provided for as those of the nobles ; for always when
the privilege of the simple freeman is not secured by
the provision which affects the high-born, an added
clause defines and protects his right. The whole
advantage is secured for the common man by the
comprehensive article which closes the essential part
of the Charter. The Xllth, Xlllth, XlVth, and
XVth articles are those most interesting. No tax is
to be exacted without a grant from the common
council of the realm; and the sense of the nation,
with regard to the tax, is to be taken in a duly sum-
moned assembly. This claim was not at all new, but
the right had never before been stated in form so
clear, and the statement startled even the Barons.

1 Stubbs: Constitutional History, I, p. 532.

2 For the document in full, see Appendix A.

MAGNA CHARTA. 49

The struggle for it did not end here, the claim not
being fully conceded and firmly established until the
close of the century. The nobles, as regards those
below them, are bound here in the same way as the
King. The XXXIXth and XLth clauses are famous
and precious enunciations of principles. In these the
right to be tried by his peers is secured to every free-
man. This, too, was no novelty ; the very formula
used is probably derived from certain ancient laws ;
but the declaration was important. It is no new
freedom, therefore, now for the first time appearing,
but simply a coming up into consciousness again of
the ancient right, and a revival of the old determina-
tion to make the right good.^

It was probably through the clergy, the great
Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, in particular,
that the rights of the Commons — free- L^ngton's
holders, merchants, even villeins — were ^'"■''■
so carefully regarded. These churchmen and their
successors led and acted for the people until the
Reformation, three hundred years after this time,
with little jealousy of their growing influence, and
it was the extinction of the influence of these natural
leaders of the people, which caused the nation to fall
so completely into despotic hands after the Wars of
the Roses. It was in the North of England that the
cry for freedom was first heard ; but it was taken up
at length by the baronial party in general, and the
demands became definite under the hand of Langton,
who followed in hi^ redaction models of former times.
In such fashion as they could, the masses of men,
until now mute since the Conquest in all but local

1 The account o£ Magna Charta is summarized from Stubbs.

50 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

affairs, signified their acceptance, the Londoners, ever
foremost, in especial making plain their assent. John
yielded in the full intention of eluding his promises,
with the connivance of the Pope. He died in the
midst of the struggle, and Langton and the Barons
took early occasion to prove to his successor that
the Great Charter was no dead letter. In 1218 a
fresh promulgation of it was required of Henry HI,
as the price of a subsidy, the principle being thus
established that a redress of grievances must precede
a grant to the Crown. Though the vital provision
that men should not be taxed without their consent
was then omitted, there was no step backward; in
the succeeding three hundred years Magna Charta,
with the lacking clause restored, was confirmed more
than thirty times .^

As one pauses in the British Museum at the case
containing the autographs, looking through the glass,
,„,, , he sees within a few inches of his hand the

1 he copy of

iSTe Brwsh* Great Charter. Six hundred and seventy-
MuBeum. ^^g years have yellowed and mouldered
the parchment, which also has been shrivelled by fire.
The Latin of the mediaeval scribes is still, however,
in part, legible, the famous XXXIXth and XLth
articles standing out with especial distinctness, as if
the very flames had held them in honor. There are
the names of the Barons who, halting their battle-
steeds under the trees of Windsor forest, strode in
armor that day (how precarious were their lives !)
across the turf of Runnymede. There at the bottom

1 Hannis Taylor : Origin and Growth of the English Constitution,
I, p. 423.

MAGNA CHARTA. 51

is the great seal affixed by tlie fiat of the evil King.i
Whoever makes real .to himself the significance of
that wrinkled sheet must feel in his heart a thrill of
awe. Magna Charta in 1215, the Petition of Right
of 1628, the Bill of Rights of 1688, the Declaration
of Independence of 1776, the Constitution of the
United States of 1787, the Reform Bill of 1832,— how
memorable the series ! Each rests upon its predeces-
sor from Magna Charta forward. How venerable the
document that forms the base of such a series! and
yet Magna Charta is but a small instalment of Anglo-
Saxon freedom, — government of the people, by the
people, and for the people, — which, snatched away
from our race, has been given back to us piecemeal,
the process lasting through nearly a thousand years.
A slight share in the public governnient is thus, in
the time of John, restored to the people. We are to
trace the story until government of the people is
fully given back.

Through Henry II the feudalism, so unrestricted
in the years of Stephen, had been thoroughly curbed.
The great feudatories having been beaten down,
Richard and John felt very absolute, and the extor-
tion of Magna Charta, though, as has just been seen,
it was simply a conservative expedient designed to
maintain what had been, no doubt seemed to John a
thoroughly revolutionary proceeding. When Magna
Charta speaks of the national council, it recognizes
none as entitled to membership therein but tenants-
in-chief. Only such were summoned, and a royal
summons had now become essential. The vast num-
1 Thomson : Historical Essay on Magna Charta, pp. 422, 423.

52 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ber holding, of those subordinate to the King, were not
counted as entitled to a voice. Moreover, there is
rarely record of any opposition in the council to the
King's will, — much less of any power of initiating
measures of policy or reform. But the great year
1265 was at hand, the date of the second important
crisis of this eventful century. The practice and
obligation to do jury duty had been affording to the
lowest freemen important discipline. The shire-moots
went on as in Saxon times, made up of the land-
holders and their stewards, whom the sheriff, in his
official coat, surrounded by liveried followers, pre-
sided over; while, on the outskirts of the crowd, in
some undistinguished place, no doubt, but still a rec-
ognized and indispensable part of the assembly, the
parish priest and the reeve and four men, in coarse
brown smock-frocks of a fashion as ancient perhaps
as the function the wearers were administering (and
yet a costume still worn by the English ploughman),
voted and spoke for each township on all local mat-
ters. The time had come when representation, which
had lived on in the local self-government, was to play
a larger part. " The humble processes by which men
had made their by-laws in the manorial courts and
fined offenders, by which they had assessed estates or
presented the report of their neighbors, by which
they had learned to work with the judges of the
King's court for the determination of questions of
custom, right, justice, and equity, were the training
for the higher functions, in which they were to work
out the right of taxation, legislation, and political
determination on national action." ^

1 Stubbs: Constitutional History, I, p. 623.

MAGNA CHARTA. 53

" The representative system," says Freeman, " is the
great political invention of Teutonic Europe, the one
form of political life to which neither
Thucydides, Aristotle, nor Polybius ever representative
saw more than the faintest approach."^
" It iSj" says Dr. Francis Lieber, " a flower of civili-
zation such as neither antiquity nor the middle ages
either enjoyed or conceived of, — something direct and
positive in itself, an institution having its own full,
distinct, and independent character, .the excellence of
which is not to be measured by asking how closely it
may approach to something beyond it, which would
be the best thing, could we but have it, but which,
for some reason, we must give up forever. The rep-
resentative system seems to me one of the very great-
est institutions that adorn the pages of the history of
civilization ; for through it alone can be dbtained
real civil liberty, founded upon extensive political
societies, and not on narrow city communities." ^

Let us obtain a clear idea of the conditions under
which this precious thing must exist. It is only
fitted to peoples among whom prevails a conditions of
vigorous local self-government; for it is "s success.
not by instinct that men are able to form a proper
judgment as to the qualifications or acts of their rep-
resentatives. "Such judgment and the experience
necessary to it can never be got in any other way
than by habitual and free discussion on similar
classes of subjects among those who feel that they
have an immediate interest in the result. It is by
the habit and experience of understanding and help-

1 History of Federalism, II, p. 67.

s Dr. Francis Lieber ; Political Ethics, II, p. 313.

54 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ing to manage their own affairs and the affairs of
their own district, that men can alone have their
minds so trained as to be able to judge of the mode
in which their representatives in Parliament, or in
the narrow local council, ought to, and do, manage
the affairs of the nation, the shire, or the borough.
It is by the independence of thought and conduct to
be only acquired by the habit of being continually
called upon to express an opinion on, and to take an
active part in th& management of the affairs of their
own district, that men can alone ever be really fit
to elect representatives, either to Parliament or the
local council, or to form sound or respect-worthy
opinions on the conduct of such representatives."
For successful application, then, of the representative
system, there must also be " regular, fixed, frequent,
and accessible meetings together of the freemen
themselves, at which all matters done by the repre-
sentative bodies shall be laid before the folk, dis-
cussed, and approved or disapproved ; and at which
all matters of common interest to the respective
associated communities shall be brought forward and
fully canvassed : and having undergone this process,
the public opinion thereupon shall be truly, peace-
ably, and healthily expressed." ^

The previous consideration has made plain the fact
that in the century of the Renaissance, when Eng-
land, rising from barbarism and acquiring solidarity
as a nation, after long distraction, assumed at last a
representative system of broad national import, there
was in the land ample and adequate foundation for

•■ J. Toulmin Smith: Local Self-Govemment and Civilization, p.
29, etc.

MAGNA CHARTA. 55

it. There had existed for many ages, moots of
shires, hundreds, and tithings, — a system of local
self-government minutely ramified and wisely devised,
so that there should be fixed, frequent, regular, and
accessible meetings together of the folk in every part.
The purpose was to have the means of getting justice
nigh at hand, and also of understanding, discussing,
and determining upon all matters of common interest.
Before the Conquest, the moots had maintained them-
selves from a prehistoric day in vigorous activity;
this system, capable of thorough resuscitation, still
existed everywhere. The substructure for a repre-
sentative system, indeed, was prepared as it has been
prepared in no other race before of since. Upon this,
now, in the fulness of time, was to be reared success-
fully the very noblest of political edifices. The era
in which and the man through whom the work was
done deserve to be forever remembered.

Riding at leisure from Coventry in the early light
of an August morning, before long I was making my
way with some difficulty across a consider- gj^^^,^ ^j^
able brook, which, however men may come ^^Mhiev^^
and go, runs on forever through the rich "°°'-
English midlands. That obstacle passed, I soon
reached a gateway, passing whichj I had before me
one of the most venerable of ruins. A mighty keep of
red stone, whose walls were yards in thickness, rose
half-buried beneath heavy masses of ivy, from the
sward below. About it stood, in various stages of
decay, walls of lighter construction, the windows and
doorways of which, surmounted by the graceful, low-
pointed arch, showed that they came from the Tudor
period. Mounds of broken outline, over which the

56 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

turf had spread itself, marked the site of towers and
outworks which had undergone a demolition more
complete. Broad meadows stretched away from the
higher ground of the castle site, from which, as I lay
on the grass with the imposing mass of the keep before
me, came a sound most incongruous with the romantic
reverie to which one in such a place would like to
surrender himself , — the clatter of an American mow-
ing-machine. It was Kenilworth Castle, — a ruin as
beautiful and as rich in historic associations as any in
England. The brook which crosses the path thither
from the village is the one which once supplied water
for the moat and for the broad lake, which, covering
the lower ground aTaout, was of old an important cir-
cumstance in the strength of the position. To the
many visitors to Kenilworth, the associations of the
spot uppermost in the mind are of Leicester and Amy
Robsart, and the magnificent entertainment, described
by Scott, of Queen Elizabeth. There is another name,
however, of far greater import in the history of Anglo-
Saxon freedom, which should be remembered there,
— that of Simon de Montfort, the founder of the
House of Commons, of whom Kenilworth Castle was
the home.

He was the youngest son of the cruel crusader
against the Albigenses, the precursors of Protestant-
ism, who lived in Southern France. Foreigner and
adventurer that he was, regarded by the aristocracy
into which he pushed himself as an upstart, the ante-
cedents were strange enough for the part he was des-
tined to play, — that of a great English statesman
and patriot. He had married Eleanor, sister of King
Henry IH, and by that union had come into a front

MAGNA CHARTA. 67

rank among the Barons. It was a time of disorder
and bloodshed. Little by little concessions were
made to the rising spirit of freedom in the people.
The Great Charter was again and again confirmed.
At last, in 1264, when Simon de Montfort, at discord
with th^ King, by his victory over the royal party at
Lewes, had become arbiter of the kingdom, he sum-
moned the famous Parliament in which for the first
time the Commons of England were fairly repre-
sented, — one of the greatest landmarks in the history
of our race. It met on the 20th of January, 1265, —
not a national Parliament, in the strict sense of the
word, which in consequence of the dissensions was a
thing impossible, but an assembly of the supporters
of the existing government. The clergy, in that cen-
tury leaders of the people and friends of freedom,
were there in force, to the number of one hundred
and twenty. Of nobles, there were but twenty-three,
five earls and eighteen Barons, for the peers stood
generally for the King ; but a noteworthy feature of
the Parliament was the representation of shires, cities,
and boroughs. Two " discreet Knights " were present
for each shire, two representatives from each city and
borough. There were informalities ; " but the custom
of election was so well established that it could not
have been neglected on this occasion. He was greater
as an opponent of tyranny than as a deviser of liber-
ties. The fetters imposed on royal autocracy, cum-
brous and entangled as they were, seem to have been
an integral part of his policy ; the means he took for
admitting the nation to self-government wear very
much the form of an occasional or party expedient,
which a longer tenure of individual power might have

58 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

led him either to develop or discard. The idea, how-
ever, of representative government had ripened in his
hand ; and, although the germ of the growth lay in
the primitive institutions of the land, Simon has the
merit of having been one of the first to see the uses
and glories to which it would ultimately grow." ^

Earl Simon statds in his' century as a man of honor,
of steady purpose, and of high military and adminis-
trative ability. Church and people' loved him enthu-
siastically. He was held to be a saintly figure, and
extolled affectionately in hymns .^

At the battle of Evesham, where he was surprised
one August day in 1265, by Prince Edward, while
looking for succor from his castle of Kenilworth, he
was completely overwhelmed and afterwards slain.

1 Stubbs : Constitutional History, II, p. 100.

2 Creighton gives the following specimen among others : —

" Right many were there men of fame;
But all of them I cannot name,
So great would he the sum :
So I return to Earl Simon,
To tell the interpretation
From whence his name has come.

*' Montfort is he most rightly called :
He is the mount and he is holdt
And has great chivalry;
The truth I tell, my troth I plight.
He hates the wrong, he loves the right,
So shall have mastery.

*' Doubtless the mount he is indeed:
The Commons are with him agreed.
And praise is due to them ;
Leicester's great earl right glad may he.
And may rejoice full heartily.
To gain such glorious fame."

Translation: from Creighton's "Simon de Montfort," New York,
1877, p. 124.

MAGNA CHART A. 59

His body was cut to pieces and became the subject of
miraculous stories. His hands were severed and
given in charge to a messenger to be conveyed to a
distant place. The messenger being present at a
mass, when the host was elevated, the hands of Earl
Simon appeared from beneath their wrappings and
put themselves together palm to palm in the attitude
of prayer. So they were accustomed to do in life,
and in death the people believed the devout posture
was not forgotten.

The third critical year of the thirteenth century is
1295. When Earl Simon beheld the host of Edward
manoeuvring to compass his own destruc-

°-,-i-_, , .. ., Edward I and

tion, on the field oi Evesham, it is said the estabiish-

I'-ii p ment of the

that though he saw plainly the nearness of House of

" ■*■ *^ Commona.

his ovni overthrow, he yet admired the skill
of the Prince, and proudly claimed that he himself
had been the Prince's teacher. When Edward became
soon after one of the greatest of Kings, he showed
that in peace as well as war he was a pupil of the
man whom he had slain. Though opposed to Earl
Simon while the latter lived, yet he was constrained
to pursue the policy which had been entered upon,
and he wrought to completion the structure of the
Parliament as it stands to-day. He was a great law-
giver in a century of law-givers ; his contemporaries
were Frederick II in Germany and Italy, Louis IX
in France, and Alphonso the Wise in Castile. The
constitution, as he left it at his death in 1307, remains
to this day the model of representative institutions.
He anticipated and almost superseded constructive
legislation for two centuries, furnishing at the same
time a basis which has served until the present hour.

60 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

It was in the autumn of 1295 that he performed his
most memorable act, the last formal step which estab-
lished fully the representation of the Commons. The
form of summons addressed to the prelates is most
interesting, beginning with that quotation from the
code of Justinian transmuted by Edward from a mere
legal maxim into a great political and constitutional
principle: "As the most righteous law, established
by the provident circumspection of the sacred princes,
exhorts and ordains that that which touches all shall
be approved by all, it is very evident that the common
dangers must be met by measures concerted in com-
mon."^ The writs issued to Barons and sheriffs,
though more brief, are in similar strain. Each sheriff
is to cause two knights of his shire, two citizens of
every city, and two burgesses of every borough, to
be elected and returned, the representatives of the
Commons to bring full power from their several con-
stituencies for doing what shall be ordained by com-
mon counsel.^

The reign of Edward was ushered in by a careful
observance of the forms of election and acceptance, —
forms indeed never omitted, though sometimes they
seemed mere idle ceremony. The times were full of
tumult, — wars without and dissensions within. He
was the ruthless King who flung the Jews out of
England ; the bards of Wales prayed that ruin might
seize him, that confusion might wait upon his banners ;
— he won the victory of Falkirk, where so many Scots
bled with Wallace. He was not, indeed, above being
tempted to ambition, vindictiveness, and impatient

1 Taswell-Langmead : English Constitutional History, p. 245.

2 Stubbs : Constitutional History, II, p. 108, etc.

MAGNA CHARTA. 61

violence. But the forward steps which the nation
took, sometimes, to be sure, in spite of him, but some-
times under his guidance, were most momentous.
The Great Charter was again and again confirmed,
until it became as fixed as the hills, in the national
life ; the doctrine that grievances must be redressed
by those in power before supplies can be granted was
plainly admitted. In 1297, it was clearly established
that there can be no taxation without representation,
— the principle upon which, five hundred years later,
stood the Americans of '76, when they fought out
their freedom: Parliament, too, stood forth, a well-
defined and organized expositor of the national will.
As one wanders among the graves of the great in
Westminster Abbey, there is no tomb before which a
more reverential pause may be made than the massive,
unornamented sepulchre, built in a rude age, for the
tall, stalwart monarch, the " Longshanks " of popular
tradition, who bestrode to such pui'pose the realm to
which he was born, — Edward I, strong in arm, brain,
and soul.

62 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER V.

THE COMING UP OF THE SERES.
Edward II, 1307. Edward III, 1327. Eichard II, 1377.

It was not only in England, in the thirteenth cen-
tury, that national assemblies were coming into being.
Condition of ^^ Castilc and Arragon, town reprejsenta-
Europ^iiTthe tives wcre appearing in the cortes. M
13th century, gicily, Frederick II was instituting some;
thing very similar to the English shire-moots. In
Germany, the cities appeared by deputies in the im-
perial diet. In France, the States-General were first
summoned in 1302. These national councils were
scarcely less proud and powerful than the one at
Westminster.^ All, however, were destroyed or sank
into insignificance. Only the English Parliament
stood firmly on the constitutional right to give and
withhold money, and maintained itself. In France
and Spain, the outcome was royal absolutism. With
the passing away of the Hohenstaufen, went Fred-
erick II's institution in Italy. In Germany, there
was utter disintegration, the life of the nation being
diverted into hundreds of pretty provincial channels,
while the people were smitten into dumbness.
Meantime the Scandinavian kingdoms had scarcely
emerged into the light of history, and in Russia pop-
1 Maoaulay ; History of England, I, p. 33.

THE COMING UP OF THE SERFS. 63

ular liberty underwent a curious hemming in, from
wliich it has never recovered. In early times the
moot in the mir or Slavic village was as distinctly
marked and important as among the Saxons them-
selves. There was no development, however, of
moots above, corresponding to those of the hundred
and shire, and no use of the expedient of representa-
tion. The brilliant, ubiquitous Normans appeared to
the east of the Baltic, as they did in France, Eng-
land, Italy, and the Orient, assuming leadership here
as everywhere, and imposing a feudalism which has
endured until now. The popular life has persisted
in the mir, but has never been able to rise into
national significance.

In England, then, the ancient freedom revived, but
in England alone. Can it be said that government
of, by, and for the people had been thor-

rr-ii en Constitution

oughly restored ? By no means. The folk- oftheeariy

, -, , Parliaments.

moot had possessed all the power once.
It disappeared as regards central government, living
on under the surface, as we have seen, in the various
moots for local self-government. The witenagemote,
indeed, may have arisen from the national assembly,
but it had become so changed in character, through
the absence of all but a few rich and powerful per-
sonages, that it must be regarded as a different thing.
In the court of the Conqueror and his sons, the wite-
nagemote had not disappeared; under Henry II, it
became a complete feudal council consisting only of
the King's tenants. At last, under Earl Simon and
Edward, this grew into a full national assembly ; the
three estates, Clergy, Lords, and Commons, made it
up, — the first and last by representation, the second

64 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

directly, for each Lord had a seat by right. The
great mark left by the thirteenth century on the
constitution was the representation of the Commons.
They are recognized in Magna Charta as creatures
possessed of rights entitled to respect; under Earl
Simon they were admitted to a voice in the govern-
ment; under Edward, what Earl Simon had intro-
duced was thoroughly established and systematized.
The Parliament of 1295 is a precedent for all time
to come. As regards form, the model of Edward
has not been departed from in England, down to the
present day, and is distinctly reiiected, as will be
hereafter seen, in the constitution of America. A
quite different spirit, however, animates the ancient
framework. In Edward's time, the voice in affairs
which the people had gained was only faint. The
monarch, though not autocratic, was immensely pow-
erful ; the privileged class of nobles, the clergy, too,
possessed a might far outweighing that of the undis-
tinguished mass. At present, in England, the plain
people are nearly all-powerful ; they are all-powerful
in America and in the British dependencies. Many
centuries were destined to pass before this thorough
reinstatement of Anglo-Saxon freedom.

In the time of Edward I, one hundred and sixty-
six cities and boroughs, and thirty-seven counties
were represented in Parliament, and the

Importance of . ■*■

the knights-of- maximum number of representatives pres-

the-BDire. ■*- -^

ent was four hundred and six. It was the
knights-of-the-shire, seventy-four of them, two from
each of the thirty-seven counties, who were at first
the champions of the Commons. The divisions which
had sent them to Westminster were coeval with the

THE COMING UP OF THE SERFS. 65

earliest Saxon occupation. The interests of these
divisions were especially liable to injury at the hands
of an arbitrary King, and it was natural that the
knights-of-the-shire should be leaders in debate. It
soon became evident that they were elected partly by
the votes of the small free-holders of the counties,
the yeomen, a class which sradually grows

+lf • tf A ^ 1 -- Theysomen.

as the oppressions oi leudahsm relax (many
who had been ground down into some form of villein-
age, rising into the character of independent cultiva-
tors),^ and becomes an immensely important constitu-
ent in the strength of the nation. From the younger
sons of the yeomen were recruited the archers and
men-at-arms who made formidable the warfare of the
Edwards and the Henrys. As tradesmen in cities,
they rose often to be great merchants, and bound
together in important ways town and country. In
antiquity of possession of land and real purity of birth
they were superior, usually, to those who despised
them as ignoble, for their line went back far before
the Conquest. As the middle ages advance, the rec-
ognition of their political rights becomes more and
more distinct. There is, however, no proof that
yeomen in the middle ages ever sat in Parliament.
There was no bar to their election, and it may possi-
bly have happened, but the gentry practically monop-
olized the representation. Representation was long
regarded, not as a privilege, but as a burden ; and
quite possibly the absence of small free-holders at
Westminster was due to reluctance on their part,
rather than to neglect of them by the constituencies.

1 This movement was especially marked during the long reign of
Henry III, 1216-T2. J. Thorold Rogers : History of Agriculture and
Prices, I, p. 3.

66 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

As compared with the knights-of-the-shire, the

borough members were insignificant in their influence.

Though cities and towns had once played

UnfortuDate . . - j.* £

state of the an important part m the conservation oi

boroughs.

freedom, it had come about that there were
great irregularities in their constitutions. No uni-
form type of city and borough court, corresponding to
the shire-moot, existed. There were towns in which
local administration was in the hands of a close cor-
poration, often a body small in number ; towns, too,
where the administration remained in the hands of the
townspeople. To the former type belonged generally
the larger and older municipalities ; to the latter, the
smaller and more recent. There were towns in al-
most every stage of development between the widely
different constitutions which have been indicated, —
a state of things whence arose anomalies and obscu-
rities that gave embarrassment through many centu-
ries, — to which an end was not set, indeed, until the
reforms of 1832. Naturally this chaotic condition
of the cities and boroughs affected the efficiency of
their representation in Parliament. Often the mem-
ber stood in no fair way for the body of men for
whom he nominally sat. No wonder that as com-
pared with the knights-of-the-shire, all deputed after
one simple and uniform fashion by the county courts,
and all in a certain way men of rank, the borough-
members were at a disadvantage in undertaking the
work of legislation.

In the case of the thoughtful man, interested in
reviewing the course of things which has

The Chapter i n • i , , ,

Honsc at resulted m the world that now is, the Abbev

Westminster. i c ttt • • i

Church 01 Westminster, with all its beauty

THE COMESTG UP OF THE SERFS. 67

and great associations, will scarcely touch so deeply
as the Chapter House close by, plain comparatively in
its adornments and proportions, which, in the early
days we are now dealing with, became the regular
meeting-place of the recently constituted Parliament
of England. It is a hall octagonal in shape, with a
massive central pillar rising high, to spread out at last
into groined arcs, which form, with similar arcs pro-
ceeding from the sides, the lofty vaulted ceiling.
The seats of stone about the column and the walls
are worn and made dark with many generations that
have sat upon them. The floor is channelled deep
with the footsteps that have trodden there. In the
windows there is still old glass which must have let
in light upon the faces of the great Edwards them-
selves, as, building so much better than they knew,
they shaped, in anxious and troubled counsel with
their Barons and the representatives of their people,
the structure of the English legislature. No clear
record has come to us of the debates that echoed from
those walls. Could the stones speak, they might
bear witness to struggles as memorable as those of a
later time in Westminster Hall and St. Stephen's
Chapel, whither the Parli-ament by and by removed.
As to details, little is to be recovered. In outline,
however, the constitutional growth may still be traced.
In the first Parliaments, the four orders, the
clergy, the Barons, the knights-of-the-shire, and the
burgesses, met each by itself, for the pur-

~ , ,., ■ n \ Division of

pose 01 deliberation. Soon, however, we Pariiamentin-

Ti-i-ii.-. 1 . 11 totwo Houses.

find the knights becoming closely con-
nected with the Barons,^ by whom the knights were

1 Sir T. Erskine May ; Encyclopsedia Britaunica, art., " Parliament."

68 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

admitted apparently to an almost equal position with
themselves, both as legislators and counsellors of the
Crown. The clergy continued to hold aloof, while
the burgesses took little part, except when they were
to be taxed. But the position of the burgesses grad-
ually improved. In 1322 their right to share fully
in all legislative action was asserted; and soon,
through some obscure cause, the knights-of-the-shire,
giving up their community with the Barons, drifted
over to the side of the burgesses, with whom they coa-
lesced so thoroughly that the united classes became
known as the Commons. In 1325 is found the first
recognition of the necessity of the assent of the
Commons to making a law valid : it comes as an in-
dorsement upon a proposed act. " It cannot be done
without new law, which thing to do the Commons of
the land will not yet assent." ^ In 1327, the young
Parliament gave strong proof of its vigor in the
deposition of Edward II. In 1341 came the definite
division into two Houses, the Lords and Commons,
which has existed until the present hour, and which is
reflected in America, and in all other lands which
Anglo-Saxon freedom has touched. It is hard to
overestimate, says Green, " the importance of this
change. Had Parliament remained in four parts,
jealousies would certainly have paralyzed its action.
Had the knights and the Barons remained together,
an aristocratic oligarchy could not have been escaped.
The cause of the people derived an immense impulse
when the knights-of-the-shire placed themselves side

1 " n ne put estre fait sanz novele ley, la quele chose fere, la comu-
nalte de la terre ne vult my uncore assentit " (responsio in dorso).
Guliel. Ryley : Placita Parliamentaria, p. 619. London, 1661.

THE COMING UP OF THE SERFS. 69

by side with the burgesses. Moreover, the knights,
forming as they did a connecting link between the
higher nobles and the people, bound happily together
the whole national fabric. A new power was at once
lent to Parliament which it has never since lost.

Edward III, engaged in foreign wars, and, driven
year after year to ask for grants, brought Parliament
together in frequent sessions. With each grant the
national council took a step forward; the sphere of
its action continued to widen ; we find record of acts
regulating trade, church matters, and the general
rights of subjects. The doctrines were emphasized
that the King's needs could be supplied only by par-
liamentary grant, and that the King's min-

. , -1 1 i ii 1 ■ J? Growth of the

isters were responsible to the nation tor power of Par-
a faithful and honest discharge of their
duties ; at last from functions purely legislative, Par-
liament took hold of the work of administration. In
the Good Parliament of 1376, a most vigorous asser-
tion of authority took place. The Black Prince, sick
unto death, was anxious to secure the succession to
the throne of his young son, Richard. The prelates
at the same time stood opposed to John of Gaunt,
and the baronial party of which he was the head.
Edward III was in his dotage, and against the royal
council, which administered affairs in his name, the
Parliament now fiercely arrayed itself. Sir Peter de
la Mare, the speaker, made the walls of the Chapter
House ring with denunciations of military misman-
agement, of oppressive taxation, of money spent
without rendering account. Two ministers were
impeached and condemned: Alice Perrers, the mis-
tress who held in her control the imbecile King, was

70 ANGLO-SAXON FKEEDOM.

banished; annual sessions of Parliament and free
elections of knights-of-the-sliire were demanded ; ar-
bitrary levies of money and the encroachments of the
Pope were condemned. John of Gaunt opposed, to
be sure, powerfully. De la Mare was imprisoned and
the Good Parliament declared to be no Parliament.
The great council, however, was by no means broken
in its strength.

We are not to understand, however, that the Par-
liament, become so energetic, fairly represented the
Its imperfect entire population of England. We have
repJesentauv^e reached the time of the great revolt of the
^°^^' laborers, — a matter so interesting in .con-

nection with the story of Anglo-Saxon freedom that
we must give the circumstances a careful look. In
Alfred's day, as has been mentioned,^ the number of
freemen, or ceorls, had greatly diminished. The ter-
rible Danish wars, when the life of every man was
environed by perils, forced the ceorls to " commend "
themselves to thegns, receiving protection in return
for a labor payment. Probably, thinks Green, whose
view is here summarized,^ these dependent ceorls
were the villeins of the Norman epoch, men sunk
from pure freedom, and bound to the soil and to the
lord, but still preserving many of their ancient rights.
They retained, for instance, their lands, free as regards
all men but their lords, and still sent representatives
to hundred-moot and shire-moot. They were, there-
fore, far above the men possessed of no land, who in

1 p. 23.

2 Short History of the English People, p. 245, etc. See also Tas-
well-Langmead : English Constitutional History, p. 291, etc.

THE COMING UP OF THE SERFS. 71

the Saxon day, having no political rights, were simply
household servants or hired laborers, or at best rent-
paying tenants of land not their own. After the
conquest, however, the Norman lords and their law-
yers saw little difference between the two classes, and
both tend to blend into the one class of serfs. All
depended upon the lord, whose manor-house was the
centre of the village, with the court in the hall, where
justice was rendered and the estate administered, and
the gallows outside for the extreme penalty. The
lord's demesne, the home-farm, was close at hand,
ciiltivated by the villeins or serfs of the manor ; so
they paid their labor-rent for their holdings. They
gathered their lord's harvest, ploughed and sowed for
him, or provided his store of wood. All but the low-
est serfs were at liberty, when work for the lord was
done, to till their own holdings. The laborers must
work for the lord throughout the year. These were
at the bottom of the scale ; for the absolute slave, to
be found in the earlier period, had now disappeared.
It was the duty of the lord's bailiff to, exact from the
villeins the proper amount of service ; on the other
hand, there was a reeve or foreman of the manor,
chosen by the tenants themselves, who represented
their interests and rights.

At length this system of tenure was disturbed.
The lord would let his manor to a tenant, and the
rent paid by the tenant was called the Rise of the
feorm ; hence farm and farmer. This prac- the'free f".^
tice had a great indirect influence in break- ''°''^'^^-
ing the feudal tie between the lord and the villein.
An intermediate class — these farmers — -comes up
between the great proprietors and their dependents.

72 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

The rise of the farmer class was presently followed by
that of still another, — the free laborers. The influ-
ence of the Chnrch helped to some extent to free
the serf from land and lord. A year and a day
in a chartered town, if the fugitive meantime were
unclaimed, enfranchised him. Labor-service, too, at
last, could be commuted for money. This the lords
at first were glad to allow, for it gave them ready
cash. Even the King, Edward III, on the royal
estate, was glad to sell to his villeins freedom from
their obligations. Thus out of feudalism, came up
the yeoman, and his appearance modified the whole
social condition of the country. On a multitude of
manors, in the middle of the fourteenth century, the
lords, instead of the old feudal method, cultivated
their estates by means of paid laborers, receiving
money-rent from free tenants in place of actual
work by half-enslaved villeins.

Now, however, intervened what, for that genera-
tion, was a terrible calamity. In 1348, the Black
Death sweeping from the Levant across Europe, fell
upon England, carrying off more than one-half of its
population. Of the three or four million inhabitants
at the beginning, scarcely enough were left to keep
the country in many parts from reverting to wilder-
ness. The villages suffered well-nigh as severely as
the cities, until much of the land became almost a
desert. At once the price of labor rose enormously ;
and land-holders, and in the towns the master-crafts-
men, were threatened with ruin. Forthwith, Parlia-
ment passed the Statute of Laborers, an enactment
The statute ^^1^7 ^^ the interest of the proprietary class,
of Laborers, ^y^i^ forccd evcry poor man " to serve the

THE COMING UP OF THE SERFS. 73

employer -who shall require him to do so for the
same wages as two years before the plague." It was
also sought to bind the laborer again to the soil ; he
was forbidden to quit the parish where he had lived,
in search of better wages, even though he had bought
his enfranchisement. It was probably impossible to
enforce the law ; but the high-placed were most per-
sistent, and the statute was repeatedly re-enacted.
The harboring in towns of those who had been serfs
was vigorously put down ; a stop was set to the
commutation of labor-service for money; manumis-
sions and exemptions were cancelled on the ground
of informality ; finally, runaway laborers, when
caught, were branded upon the forehead with a hot
iron. In the country, many who had once been
villeins, but who had commuted the personal ser-
vice due from them by money-payment, had become
men of position and substance. These finding their
dear-bought freedom questioned, lent a powerful
support to the cause of those just enfranchised.
Strikes and combinations disturbed everywhere bor-
ough and shire. The serf was winning his freedom,
while those who had been masters were trying hard
to force him back into dependence. Those days are
far behind us; but here in free America that ancient
struggle for liberty, and the heroes who fought and
died to secure it, ought not to be unknown. The
cause was the same as that for which our own fathers
bled and died; its champions were the prototypes of
the names we most revere. Without doubt, a certain
license entered into the doctrines which their leaders
taught, and violence sometimes characterized their
conduct. When has it been otherwise in times of

74 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

revolution ? Their cause was in great part just ;
and it was fought for not only with much bravery,
but in the main with true forbearance and wis-
dom.

The priest, John Ball, preaching to thousands of the
stout men of Kent, descendants of the ceorls who had
The peasant been the vauguard qf Harold at Hastings,
and still always foremost when England
was in danger, gave utterance to ideas sometimes ex-
travagant, but often full of natural equity.^ " Good
people," he cried, " things will never go well in Eng-
land so long as goods be not in common, and so long
as there be villeins and gentlemen. By what right
are they whom we call lords greater folk than we ?
Why do they hold us in serfage ? If we all came of
the same father and mother, Adam and Eve, how can
they say or prove that they are better than we, if it
be not that they make us gain for them by our toil
what they spend in their pride? They are clothed
in velvet, and warm in their furs and their ermines,
while we are covered with rags. They have wine
and spices and fair bread ; and we, oat-cake and straw,
and water to drink. They have leisure and fine
houses ; we have pain and labor, the rain and the
wind in the fields. And yet it is of us and our toil
that these men hold their state."

Parliament, although in these very years it was
boldly curbing the tyranny of the rulers as never
before, became reactionary through fear of the wide-
spread levelling and socialistic doctrines. As before
it had legislated in the interests of the rich in
passing the Statute of Laborers, so in 1380, by

1 Froissart : Translation of Thomas Johnes, Chap. LXXIII, etc.

THE COMING UP OF THE SERFS. 75

the imposition of a heavy poll-tax, which ground
harshly the faces of the poor, England was set on
fire from end to end. The homely rallying cries
that passed from man to man have sometimes been
preserved. " John Ball," ran one, " greeteth you
all, and doth for to understand he hath rung your
bell. Now right and might, will and skill, God
speed you every dele." "Jack Miller," said the
summons of another leader, " asketh help to turn his
mill aright. He hath grounden small, small; the
King's son of Heaven he shall pay for all." " Jack
Carter," declared another, " prays you all that ye
make a good end of that ye have begun." " False-
ness and guile," said Jack Trewman, "have reigned
too long, and truth hath been set under a lock, and
falseness and guile reigneth in every stock. True
love is away that was so good, and clerks for wealth
work them woe. God do bote for now is time." In
these rude cries and songs, says Green,^ we have the
forerunners of the fiercely just invectives of Milton
and Burke, instinct like the latter fulminations with
a longing for right rule and plain justice, with a
scorn for the immorality of the nobles and the infamy
of the court, and a terrible resentment at the perver-
sion of the law.

Formidable insurrections broke out. The rebels of
Kent and Sussex marched upon London with such
boldness and in such multitudes that op- Bearing of
position to them seemed impossible. Rich- ^'"^"■^'^ ^■
ard II, lately crowned, a boy of fifteen, made a speech
from a boat in the Thames to the crowd on the
banks. The youth in these days bore himself with
1 Short History of the English People, p. 250, etc.

76 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

all the bravery of a true Plantagenet. His portrait as
a young man still looks down upon you in the choir
of Westminster Abbey, the earliest contemporary
representation extant of any English sovereign.^ The
cheeks are full and florid, the hair ruddy, the eye, one
thinks, capable of frank and kindly expression, the
figure kingly. The insurgent laborers felt kindly
toward the handsome, spirited boy ; but when those
who surrounded him refused to allow him to land
among them, they shouted angrily their war-cries,
and along the lanes, full of the beauty of June,
poured wrathfuUy toward the great city. The poorer
artisans opened the gates to them ; at once fire was
put to the palace of John of Gaunt, the head of the
brutal nobles; to the houses of foreign merchants,
for there was a vehement, probably an unreasonable,
hatred against things un-English; and also to the
quarters of the lawyers in the Temple, for whom
there was especial dislike, as the class from which
were drawn the manorial stewards, the usual instru-
ments of oppression.

In this rising, declared by Stubbs to be one of the
most portentous events of English history, the most
Wat Tyler noteworthy leader was Wat Tyler, of
ofBeaex. Esscx, a man of excellent purposes and
ability, however rough. In the revolt, he tried hard
to impose upon his followers a wholesome discipline ;
a plunderer carrying a silver vessel from the burning
palace of John of Gaunt was himself thrown into
the flames. By such sharp reminders he taught Ms
men that the effort in behalf of better justice could
not be served by thieves and robbers. There is some

1 Stanley : Memorials of Westminster Abbey, p. 147.

THE COMING UP OF THE SERFS. 7T

reason for supposing he cherished a high plan for the
overthrow of feudalism and a restoration of the old
government of counties and districts, through the
ancient moots of the people ; in a word, Anglo-Saxon
freedom. The scheme in that day was wild and
premature, but in the stout-hearted laborer may be
beheld some of the traits of a Cromwell. ^ His hour
soon came. The crowd of rebels, no doubt rough
and unsavory to the last degree, overran London,
browbeating courtier and citizen. At the Tower,
they took by the beard in rude horse-play the knights
of the royal household, declaring that henceforth
they were to be fellows and comrades ; but presently
after, in the Chapel of St. John (the Norman arches
of which, together with the gray columns and ancient
carving, the visitor may still admire), they found
lurking the Archbishop of Canterbury, against whom
they cherished an especial spite. He was haled from
•sanctuary, and at once beheaded; nor was that the
only homicide. " We will that you free us forever,"
cried a multitude, meeting the King in the streets,
" us and our lands ; and that we be never named nor
held for serfs." " I grant it," said Richard, and bade
them go home, pledging himself to issue charters of
freedom and amnesty. On June 15th, Richard and
Wat Tyler came face to face at Smithfield. During
the interview, Walworth, lord mayor of London,
struck the popular champion dead with a sudden
thrust of his dagger. " Kill, kill ! " thundered the
crowd. " They have slain our captain ! " "I am
your captain and your King," cried young Richard,

1 J. Thorold Rogers: History of Agriculture and Prices in England,
I, p. 94.

78 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

riding promptly and fearlessly to the front of the
crowd. " Follow me." They followed him loyally
and trustingly ; for the people had a firm faith that
could the sovereign be but separated from evil coun-
sellors, their grievances would be fully redressed.
Richard promised faithfully ; a throng of clerks was
Treacher of ®^* ^° work to prepare charters, which were
the King. igsucd by the score, securing to their re-
ceivers ample rights. Only treachery, however, was
in the minds of the King and his nobles. When the
insurgents were dispersed, at the earliest safe moment
the sternest vengeance was exacted. The pledges were
broken; fire and sword raged throughout the land.
Seven thousand died on the gallows and in the field.

A few incidents are related of that time of blood,
showing how true was the temper of those strivers
for freedom, At St. Albans, for instance, near Lon-
don, the rule of the great abbey over its tenantry had
been most oppressive. In the uprising, the laborers
had obtained a charter, and full of joy, they tore
from the pavement of the cloisters the mill-stones,
which were laid there in token that grain could be
ground nowhere on the demesne but at the abbey
mill; these were broken to pieces in proof of the
emancipation, " like blessed bread in church." When
the rebels, taken at disadvantage, were put down,
William Grindecobbe, their leader, was offered his life
if he would persuade the St. Albans men to restore
the charter. He bravely bade his followers to take
no thought for him. " If I die," he said, " I shall die
for the cause of the freedom we have won, counting
myself happy to end my life by such a martyrdom."

When Richard was reproached for his faithlessness,

THE COMING UP OF THE SEEPS. 79

he answered, with an insolence as precocious as the
cool self-possession he had shown in the time of
danger: "Villeins you were, and villeins you are.
In bondage you shall abide, and that not your old
bondage, but a worse." It is melancholy to read of
the conduct of Parliament in this crisis.

A Till -CI 1 Aristocratic

Assembled on the suppression of the revolt, temper of

'■ ^ Parliament.

the Parliament was met by a royal message,
indicating a willingness to yield. " If you desire to
enfranchise and set at liberty the serfs by your com-
mon assent, as the King has been informed that some
of you desire, he will consent to your prayer." But
the Parliament was stern. The King's charters, it
was answered truthfully, were legally null and void,
as not being authorized by the national council.
" Their serfs were their goods, and the King could
not take their goods from them but by their own
consent ; and this consent we have never given and
never will give, were we all to die in one day."^

The cause of the revolted villeins seemed to go down
in blood, but really a vital blow had been struck at
villeinage, and the condition of the laborers improved.
In spite of violence and threats from those high in
place, the process continued, the class of yeomen being
steadily recruited from those coming up from below.

" When Adam delired and Eve span,
Who was then the gentleman? "

the question asked in all the shops and fields of
England in Wat Tyler's day, continued to be pro-
pounded, though perhaps under the breath, and the
democratic spirit thus kept alive was before long
again to show itself.

1 Green : Short History, pp. 254, 255.

80 ANGLO-SAXON FKEEDOM.

CHAPTER VI.

THE TIMES OF THE LANCASTRIANS.

Henry IV, 1399. Edward IV, 1461.

Hemy V, 1413. Edward V, 1483.

Henry VI, 1422. Richard lU, 1483.

Among the sovereigns of England, Richard II has
the unenviable distinction of entertaining the most
„ . . , extreme notion of the royal prerogative,

Deposition of j j. o '

Richard II. and of having urged most strongly the
idea of hereditary succession, as opposed to the popu-
lar choice. He tried to make himself absolute, strik-
ing at the very root of the freedom now in process of
revival. Aiming ■ at a recognition of despotism, he
tried to supersede Parliament by a commission. In
Parliament there was little representation as yet of
the humbler classes. So it was to be for many cen-
turies, — in fact, until the influence of American
example began to be felt. Nevertheless, it stood,
however imperfectly, for the nation, and in these
days was determined not to crouch before the King.
When Richard 11 therefore claimed that the nation
must provide for him whether he behaved well or ill,
— that, as supreme law-giver, he could dispense with
a statute, alter its wording, or revoke it entirely, —
that he might, in fact, do away with any institution
interfering with his theory of sovereign right, Par-

THE TIMES OF THE LANCASTRIANS. 81

liament, in 1399, deposed him, and chose a prince
of the Lancastrian line to rule in his powerofpar
place. In this successful assumption of """'«'"■
right, Parliament taised itself to a position scarcely-
inferior to that which it vindicated for itself two
hundred and fifty years later, against the oppressions
of Charles I. By successive steps the Commons had
become the active and aggressive force of the national
council. At first, " Vos humbles, pauvres Communes
prient et supplient pour Dieu et en oeuvre de charity,"
that their petitions may be granted. Soon they estab-
lish the principle that no grants can come until griev-
ances are redressed. They next claim the right to
examine the royal accounts, to regulate the royal
expenditures ; and at last they hold responsible to
themselves the ministers and depose the King.^

At the accession of Henry IV Parliament seemed
likely, indeed, to become supreme. In 1406, the
demands of the Commons and the concessions of the
King, who, aware that he owed his dignity to parlia-
mentary election, dared not withstand the legislature,
amounted almost to a supersession of royal authority.
Never before, and not for two hundred years after,
were the Commons so strong as under Henry IV,
and among them, as before, the leaders were the
sturdy knights-of-the-shire. A long step was taken
in this reign toward a recognition of the important
principle that money-grants must originate in the
lower House. But the House of Commons was more
and more losing touch with the people. To be sure,
the knights-of-the-shire were still elected in the old
shire-moots, every freeman having a voice, though in

1 Hannis Taylor : Origin and Growth of Eng. Const., I, p. 444.

82 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the case of the poor and landless the voice was
scarcely appreciable. The functions of the shire-
moots were becoming, however, greatly restricted.
As early as' the reign of Edward III we find side by
side with them in each county the Court of Quarter
Sessions, made up of justices appointed by royal fiat,
and these were fast absorbing all judicial and admin-
istrative powers. The time was coming when the
broad suffrage of the shire-moots was also to be
greatly curtailed.

Henry V was a great constitutional King. Probably
nation and sovereign have never been so completely at
Popularity of ^^^ ^® Under him. A glamour surrounds
Henry V. ^jjg gecoud Lancastrian such as attaches to
no other sovereign of England. He was the ideal of
Shakspere, in whose portrayal of him, first as Prince
Hal, and then as a brilliant, heroic leader, all the re-
sources of the most consummate genius are lavished.
Shakspere had, unmistakably, as a subject for his
picture a man of noble qualities, and probably has
not greatly exaggerated the traits. Sober history is
scarcely calmer in its eulogy than the lines of the poet.
Into what he might have matured had he lived longer,
no one can say ; but no King so holds the hearts of
the English-speaking race, with the possible exception
of Alfred, as the young victor of Agincourt. It is an
interesting moment for any thoughtful man, when,
with his mind charged with the immortal Shaksperian
delineations, the wild frolicking with Falstaff, the
chivalric prowess at Shrewsbury, the camp-fires in
Picardy, by which " each battle sees the other's
umbered face," the deeds the next day of the men
whose hearts were in trim though " there was no piece

THE TIMES OF THE LANCASTRIANS. 83

of feather in the host," — he stands before the head-
less effigy in Westminster Abbey, and looks up at the
relics above, — the spear, the saddle, the helmet, so
far to the front with the King in the mSlee, when the
knights of France underwent such humiliation. Like
his father, Henry V knew well that he had no title
except that he had been chosen by the nation to rule.
Parliament was becoming oligarchical; Henry was
more democratic even than his House of Commons,
asserting often the rights of the unrepresented against
class-legislation.i He was the idol of high and low.
He gave himself to the nation, and the nation took
him to its heart, surrendering itself to his leadership
with full confidence in his capacity and good-will.
The knights-of-the-shire upheld him in the delibera-
tions of the Chapter House ; the people poured money
into his coffers, making nothing of the heavy sums,
because the right to give and the right to withhold
were fully recognized; the children of the people,
" the good yeomen whose limbs were made in Eng-
land," 2 proved abundantly on foreign fields " the
mettle of their pasture," making light, for the sake of
such a King, of cold and hunger and hard marching ;
while on the battle-day, as matchless archers, they
pierced the panoply of the best chivalry of Europe
to such effect as almost to destroy France.

Evil days, however, were at hand. The world was
not ready for parliamentary government. With the
Lancastrians, it seemed at first on the point of being

1 Church : Henry V, p. 92.

2 The fifteenth century was the golden age of the English yeomanry,
a degree of social equality then existing such as has not often been wit-
nessed. — Rev. S. W. Thackeray ; Land and the Community, pp. 28, 29.

84 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

realized, but a reaction set in. " The Wars of the
Roses," says Comines, found England, " among all
the world's lordships of which I have knowledge,*
that where the public weal is best ordered, and where
least violence reigns over the people." An English
King " can undertake no enterprise of moment with-
out assembling his Parliament, which is a thing most
wise and holy, and therefore are their Kings better
served " than the absolute sovereigns of the conti-
nent.^ Just as the Lancastrian power was

Fortescue on . i , i tt (» ir i

the English passing away, and the House oi i ork was

constitution. ^ T , . i rt- t n

becoming supreme, a great 3udge, oir J ohn
Fortescue, set forth in noble terms the constitutional
view of the dynasty which was perishing. The King,
he declares, exists for the kingdom ; not the kingdom
for the King. His power is derived from the people,
without whose consent he can neither change the
laws nor impose taxes. The good King rules, not
from the desire of power, but to take care of others.
The origin of kingship is the will of the people ; and
though its conservation is secured by hereditary suc-
cession, yet righteous judgment is its true sustaining
power and justification. The King is not only a sov-
ereign lord, but a public servant, — not less than the
Pope, a " servus servorum Dei." ^ Under the Lan-
castrians, the right of the Commons to share in legis-
lation of every kind and to debate freely all matters
of public interest was admitted. The two Houses of
Parliament were regarded as co-ordinate, equal, and
mutually dependent assemblies. While the Lords
held judicial power, the Commons originated grants.

1 Quoted by J. R. Green: History of the English People, II, p. 5.

2 Fortescue : De Laudlbus Legum Angliae.

THE TIMES OE THE LANCASTRIANS. 85

Freedom of discussion in the lower House was not
to be interfered with ; no member was to be called to
account for words spoken in debate. The House of
Commons in theory now and long afterward repre-
sented fully and fairly the nation.

Unfortunately, theory and practice did not coincide.
Indeed, the people themselves seemed to hang back.
The constituencies often regarded the sending of
members to Parliament as a burden, and those elected
often went unwillingly. In Henry Vth's day, their
trust in the sovereign was so great that they did not
care to assume the burden of self-government. The
times when public spirit is most vivid are times
when tyrants most oppress. Kings weak and wicked
are sometimes greater benefactors than the strong
and good.

Notwithstanding that Parliament now had asserted
itself so strongly, we have to notice the

. ° ■' Sudden decay

fact, at first view very remarkable, that the of the power

■' of Parliament.

nation suddenly in its progress exhibited
a reactionary spirit from which it did not recover for
a century and a half. The change, though surprising,
is explicable. In the first place, widespread com-
punction had been felt on account of the deposition
of Richard II. That the King should be hereditary
as well as elected was ingrained in the ideas of the
time. Richard had believed that

" Not all the water in the rude, rough sea
Can wash the balm from an anointed King,"

and multitudes of his subjects were far from being
indisposed to acquiesce. Though the doctrine of the
jus divinum, the divine right of the next of kin to be

86 ANGLO-SAXON FKEEDOM.

chosen, was by no means as yet established, there was
a tendency in that direction. The uneasiness felt by
the people over the treatment of Richard was re-
garded by them as an admonition of conscience ; and
when after his speedy death the memory of his
unworthiness died out, and the disposition grew
stronger and stronger to credit him with virtues that
he did not possess, repentance became deep in the
hearts of many on account of the deposition of 1399.
The Lancastrian Kings themselves probably shared
with the people this uneasiness. Shakspere makes
it one element of the heart-break of Henry IV that
he felt his occupation of the throne to be unlawful ;
and in the most critical moment of the career of
Henry V, the night before Agincourt, he vows noth-
ing more devoutly than to provide masses for the
repose of Richard's soul. The strong qualities of
the first Lancastrians kept this remorse in their
subjects in check ; but when Henry VI succeeded, a
prince under whose weak sway great suffering had
come to pass, the sentiment rapidly grew, preparing
the way for a noteworthy enhancement of the power
of the King, which we shall presently have to notice.
In the second place, the House of Commons now
took a course which greatly depressed its character.
In 1429, a statute was passed restricting
oi representa- the franchise, the most reactionary meas-

tioninthe , i n t-.

Bhires and UTS, says i^ rccmau,^ ever taken by a r ar-

boroughB. ''

liament. Complaint is expressed that
county elections have been made by " a very great,
outrageous, and excessive number of people dwelling

I Freeman : Growth of the English Constitution, p. 101. Taswell-
Langmead ; English Constitutional History, p. 340, etc.

THE TIMES OF THE LANCASTRIANS. 87

within the same counties, of which most part was
people of small substance and of no value, whereof
every of them pretended a voice equivalent, as to
such elections to be made, with the most worthy-
knights and esquires dwelling within the same coun-
ties." To prevent, therefore, "the manslaughters,
riots, batteries, and divisions," which were likely to
take place, no one was to vote who did not possess
" free land or tenement to the value of forty shillings
by the year, at least, above all charges." Forty shil-
lings in that day was equivalent to forty pounds at
present ; the execution of the law led to a widespread
disenfranchisement of poor men.

While calamity thus fell upon the shires, the large-
ness of borough life began also to be much curtailed.
Charters were procui-ed from the Crown, which
turned many boroughs into close bodies, excluding all
from the franchise who were not burgesses by birth
or long apprenticeship. Borough-moots generally had
disappeared, giving place to councils which were
either close corporations or the members of which
were elected solely by the wealthier burgesses. The
new charters, for the most part, conferred the right of
choosing the parliamentary representatives upon these
councils, or upon a still more restricted body called
the " select men," appointed from the council. Here
began the process of degradation, which, before long,
made borough-representation a mockery. Corrupt
influences found here an easy opportunity. The
small electing cliques could easily be bought up or
intimidated, or in some way cajoled by the great
nobles, land-owners, or the Crown. Hence the rep-
resentatives were often but nominees and creatures

e» ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

of the powerful. The boroughs were seized on by
the great as their prey, by means of which they could
send to the House of Commons their subservient
instruments. As has been seen, the borough-repre-
sentation in the lower House had not from the first
been as efficient as that of the shires. From the time
we have reached it deteriorated, the members stand-
ing in no proper sense for the populations in whose
name they held their places. In the constitutional
history of our race no abuses are more inveterate than
those arising from this cause, abuses not remedied
until the time of the younger Pitt and Lord John
Russell.

Since both in shire and borough so little account
was taken for a representation of the people. Parlia-
ment shrank fast into the shape of an ohgarchy rep-
resenting only the rich and powerful, and prepared
to become the subservient tool of the sovereigns.
All this abuse did not pass without protest. Hitherto,
all suitors who had attended the sheriff's court had
voted without danger of challenge for the knights-of-
the-shire. Nothing in the land was more ancient
than those venerable moots. For more than a thou-
sand years the forefathers had gathered from hun-
dred and tithing, and every land-holding man had
had his voice. When Earl Simon called into being
the House of Commons, this general suffrage under-
went no abridgment. In electing the two " discreet
knights," even the villeins had had an influence,
though it might be small. To some extent, the
knights-of-the-shire were genuinely representative of
the people, and the steady advance of the House of
Commons into power, as the middle ages give way

THE TIMES OF THE LANCASTRIANS. 89

to the modern era, was due to their effective leader-
ship. Ill Wat Tyler's day there seems to have been
in Parliament a small minority who stood even for
the very poor.^ The gulf was now widening be-
tween high and low, and the low-born soon found a
champion.

History has too often portrayed unfairly the medi-
seval uprisings of artisans and laborers, doing the
scantest possible justice to the leaders who j^^^ (,^^^.^
stood in the fore-front of danger, often '^'•«"*™-
giving their lives to their cause. The Froissarts and
Monstrelets find nothing attractive in the citizen or
cultivator as compared with the brilliant knight, and
pass him by with a curt word of contempt or even
hatred. When poetry conspires with history to be-
little and malign, we may well feel in our democratic
days that hard measure has been accorded, and it
is a grateful task to say a word on the other side.
When Jack Cade, in 1450, at the head of a multitude
of poor men, grandsons of those yeomen of Kent
whom John Ball had fired for the maintenance of
their rights seventy years before, burst into London
and held the city at his mercy, Shakspere, drawing a
picture for the aristocratic patrons of his theatre, por-
trays him for us as an unruly churl, whose cause had
no dignity, and who, if he had succeeded, would
have instituted a reign of coarse license. We have,
as we read, no sympathy with him or those whom he
led when the revolt is rolled back, and Alexander
Iden takes the life of the miserable fugitive. But
the rising of which Jack Cade was the central figure,
like that of which Wat Tyler was the central figure,

1 See the speech ol Bichard II to Farliament, p. 79,

90 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

was really provoked by grievous oppression, — by
unjust and harmful innovations upon the old order
of things, against which the mass of the people stur-
dily but vainly braced themselves, no revolutionists,
but thorough conservatives. " It was sought to draw
a distinction between gentlemen and other people,"
they complained; declaring, moreover, "that the
people of the shires are not allowed to have free
elections in choosing knights, but letters have been
sent from divers estates to the great nobles of the
county, enforcing the tenants and others to choose
other persons than the common will is."

The protest failed of effect; the ancient freedom
was pushed back ; the people struggling for a liberty
Justice of his oucc their possession were roughly beaten
cause. ^Q ^jjg earth. It belongs to us to think of

them and their leaders not contemptuously, but com-
passionately and reverently. When we have had in
our imaginations that scene in Smithfield, in which
the lord mayor of London struck with his dagger
Wat Tyler, asking for a redress of grievances at the
head of his peasant army, admiration probably has
flowed toward the brilliant young King whose cool-
ness and address turned the incident to his own
advantage ; and not toward the man, who, by sorrow
over the woes of the land, had been called from his
humble toil. The soul of Richard, however, was
black then with cruelty and treachery, and he speedily
matured into a tyrant; while his victim, it is now
declared, possessed the sturdy virtue and much of the
ability of a Cromwell. So, too, we can read between
the lines of calumniating chroniclers traits of the hero
in Jack Cade. We pause reverently under the old

THE TIMES OF THE LANCASTRIANS. 91

elm at Cambridge, in whose shadow flashed the sword
of Washington as he stood at the head of the yeomen
who were to bring to grief, in the eighteenth century,
prerogative and privilege. Why not stand with simi-
lar reverence before " London Stone," built into the
church foundation there in Cannon Street, which tra-
dition says was touched by the sword of Jack Cade ?
He, too, stood at the head of an army of yeomen, like
Washington's host, hard of hand from the flail and the
plough-handle, beaten by the weather as they wrested
from the earth their food and raiment. Indeed, the
lineal forefathers of Washington's men at Cambridge
were, to some extent, those very men of Cade.^ The
cause in the two cases was substantially the same.
Each leader was a strict conservative, striving to Adn-
dicate from encroachment immemorial rights, upon
which those high in place had laid sacrilegious hands.
To one the fates were kind, and his name is among
those most honored of men. The other failed; he
was hunted to his death, and upon his grave has been
heaped little but contumely. The fulness of time has
come; the people, in whose behalf these leaders
strove, has become supreme. Will not the people
accord to the victims something of the honor which
it has bestowed upon the victors ?

During the Wars of the Roses the Lancastrian
power went down, while the tlouse of York, in the
person of Edward IV, in 1461, attained the The wars of
throne. Though the great nobles and
their retainers were largely cut off in the bloody

1 This was especially the case, pefhaps, as regards the men from
Middlesex Co., Mass. ; Concord, for instance, was peopled by descend-
ants of yeomen of Kent.

92 AJSTGLO-SAXOlsr FREEDOM.

battles, the nation at large suffered surprisingly little,
undergoing slight disturbance, enjoying, indeed, a
certain amount of prosperity even while the armies
clashed. Naturally, the power of Parliament in these
years rapidly died down. While the Lords were to
such an extent destroyed, the Commons, through
causes which have been detailed, became obsequious.
The more the upper middle class stood out as gentry,
and after the wide disappearance of the high nobility
became an important body, the greater became the
separation between the upper middle class and the
orders below them. Parliament had become mainly
the representative of the gentry. The lower mass,
deeply estranged by the injustice and contempt visited
upon them, were more disposed to trust the King
than those who had thrust them down. It is easy to
see why there was no murmuring when Edward IV,
neglecting almost entirely the ancient ceremonies of
election and recognition, claimed to be the rightful
King solely as the heir of Richard II. It was, says
Stubbs, a complete legitimist restoration, the proceed-
ing presenting the strongest possible contrast to that
at the accession of Henry IV, two generations before.
Edward went on as he began ; parliamentary action
was suspended for years together, and during the
whole reign, for the first time in English history,
there was no single enactment for increasing the
security or liberty of the subject. Richard III, sus-
tained by no proper title, catching at every straw to
keep himself afloat in his ill-gotten dignity, sought a
recognition from Parliament and from the citizens of
London, but it was a farcical travesty of the solemn
and venerable form of election.

THE TIMES OE THE LANCASTRIANS. 93

Witli the old Baronage destroyed and the political
strength of the Commons so far gone in decay, the
strength of the Crown at the end of the Accession of
fifteenth century was nearly doubled, a ^ " °"'
change so marked as to be little short of a revolution.
At the very hour when Anglo-Saxon freedom seemed
about to be irrecoverably lost, certain Bristol ships
piloted by Venetian sailors, the Cabots, father and
son, touched, first of civilized men, the shores of a
vast continent to the west. In that continent, for
the first time, freedom was to have its full recognition
and development ; largely through influences going
back from that continent, freedom for the mother-
land also was, after centuries of doubt, to be fully
secured; — for the mother-land and also for mighty
Anglo-Saxon peoples in the ends of the earth.

94 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER VII.

DEPRESSION OF THE POWER OF PARLIAMENT.

Henry VII, 1485. Edward VI, 1547. James 1, 1603.

Henry VTEI, 1509. Mary, 1553. Charles 1, 1625.

Elizabeth, 155S.

We have reached now the period of the Tudors.

When Henry VII acceded to the throne, in 1485,

but twenty-nine Lords were left as a rem-

Great increase ci in t -t

of the power nant of the old nobility; a continual hu-

of the Crown. i i -r»

miliation of the weakened Baronage was a
main object of his policy, which he had no difficulty
in following out. The growth of the royal authority
became with Henry VIII portentous, a sudden accel-
eration taking place in consequence of the extinction
of stiU another power, which heretofore had done
much to keep it in check. In our narrative, it has
been made apparent that in the Lancastrian epoch
and the years just preceding, the champions of free-
dom were in the main the knights-of-the-shire. Still
earlier the Barons, in the time of Magna Charta and
the reform of Simon de Montfort, by wresting from
nascent despotism a portion of the nation's rights,
improperly alienated, gave the popular leaders the
vantage-ground without which they would have failed
of opportunity. In a time yet earlier, it was the
Church that had stood foremost in the contest for
liberty, its policy during the early Middle Ages,

DEPRESSION OF POWER OF PARLIAMENT. 95

against the violence of William Rufus, the confused
lawlessness of the reign of Stephen, the cunning of
Henry I, constituting one long protest against the
predominance of mere brute strength.^ It was due
to Langton and the ecclesiastics mainly, indeed, that
the Great Charter contained so many popular features,
though the Barons then were coming into the fore-
ground. In fact, until the period we have now
reached, though less prominent, perhaps, in the later
centuries than the earlier, the Church is to be found
at the right hand of every influence that tended to
thwart oppression. It upheld the effort of the martyr
of Evesham, whom it was almost ready to canonize ;
in the person of the humble priest, John Ball, it
was at the side of Wat Tyler ; in Wickliffe and his
followers, who, however unorthodox, were, neverthe-
less, cowled and tonsured priests, it stimulated power-
fully the impulses toward freedom which throbbed in
the hearts of the people. As the Baronage had
become impotent, so the Church was now to be
stricken down.

Henry VIII divorced England from Rome, de-
stroying, as he did so, the monastic system and appro-
priating one-third of the revenues of the Effect of the
Church. He constructed a new nobility, Kefomation.
composed largely of new men whom he enriched
from the spoils of the Church, who naturally were
most obsequious, disposed to defend to the last the
order of things to which they owed place and pelf.
He obtained a lex regia to make him supreme law-
giver; and though he was politic as to interfering
with Parliament, he contrived to bring it about, that

1 Stubbs : Constitutional History, III, p. 592.

96 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Parliament did little more than register his decrees.
Church and State were now under one over-lord.^
Through the Reformation, the Crown had won a
quite new and most independent position. In the
domain of the Church, the Sovereign as Defender of
the Faith, replacing the Pope, ruled as absolute head,
with a hierarchy of ecclesiastics in subordination to
him, bishops, canons, and priests. In secular matters,
his authority, according to the constitution, was asso-
ciated with that of the nation represented in the Par-
liament, which possessed the power of making the
laws. The House of Lords, however, were mainly
the King's creatures ; the House of Commons, through
abuses in the borough representation and the restric-
tion of the franchise in the shires, had quite lost its
old force. Here also was open to Henry a door to
absolutism through which he was not slow to pass.
He was astute as he was audacious, and his reign was
marked by certain excellent featiires which caused it
to be endured, which even made it popular.

Henry should be treated fairly by the modern
world. He can hardly be cleared from the charge of
being brutal, rapacious, and tyrannical. He broke
the hearts and cut off the heads of noble men and
lovable women who had served and esteemed him
faithfully. In the- matter of the dissolution of the
monasteries, the spirit that animated, and the means
that were employed, were worse than questionable.
If the claim of the Anglican Church, that it was bom
in the days of St. Augustine, be granted, yet at its
re-birth, under Henry VIII, it can scarcely be denied

1 Gneist is here for the most part followed : Geschichte und heutige
Gestalt der Aemter in England, p. 180, etc.

DEPRESSION OF POWER OF PARLIAMENT. 97

that some unpleasant figures stood about the cradle.
The redoubtable Spenserian giant, Kirkrapine, was
a valiant defender of tender Anglicanism. What
would have become of it under Bloody Mary, had it
not been stoutly upheld by Henry's new nobles, liv-
ing on lands and supported by rents sequestrated
from the monasteries, lands and rents sure to revert
to their former owners had Rome once recovered her
lost ground ?i Again, could Henry have had his
way, he would have made himself a complete despot.
Froude, without doiibt, has estimated him
too highly. Still he was patriotic, in a cer- character of
tarn way well-meanmg, most attractively
courageous, and sometimes wise. Anticipating what
is called in our day enlightened despotism,^ the royal
authority prohibited what in times since has often
become a crying evil, the depopulation of the land by
over-large estates and the changing of arable into
pasture; earnest care was shown for education and
the welfare of the poor, fpr amusements and exercises
in arms, for guilds and trades-unions. Less success-
ful, probably, were Henry's efforts to regulate the
rate of wages and the price of provisions, and his
prohibition, in the interest of the poor, of inventions
likely to displace hand-labor. His intentions, how-
ever, were here the best; and if he was in error, his
were errors which the world has not yet outgrown.
He had to a marked degree that characteristic of a
great ruler, the power of choosing instruments, and
he caused it to inure fully to the welfare of his realm.
His officials, high and low, were skilful, and to each

1 Green : Short History, pp. 350, 351. Taswell-Langmead, p. 435.
^ Aufgeklarter Despotismus.

98 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

was assigned, with good discrimination, the work
which he could do best. For all this, it is certain
that a grateful echo came from the folk, and un-
feigned admiration from clear-seeing contemporaries
of a higher intelligence. A consequence of these
traits of Henry's rule was a condition of internal
quiet, comfort, and prosperity in city, borough, and
Good points shire. Bluff Harry, in spite of the enor-
18 reign, jjj^^^gg Qf which he was guilty, got very

near the popular heart. His Parliament was not so
much subservient, as disposed of its own will to
acquiesce in what the King imposed. His procedure,
arbitrary, but in great part well intended and often
beneficent, had in it so much of good that the dispo-
sition grew strong among men to overlook the bad.
It is to be noticed, as the special constitutional
change of Henry's reign, that the House of Commons
acquired a preponderating influence over the House
of Lords.i As compared with the authority of the
King, the authority of Parliament seemed nearly
superseded. In a hundred years, the political pendu-
lum had swung through its entire arc ; for, in 1406,
under Henry IV, with his doubtful title, the power
of Parliament had seemed on the point of supersed-
ing that of the King.^ A dose of misrule was needed
to set the nation right.

Misrule came soon after Henry's death, with his

daughter Mary. A Catholic herself, she married the

prince afterward Philip II, soon to be

tion under the head and front of Catholic Europe.

Mary.

England, however, had turned its back
definitely upon the ancient faith, and when Mary

1 S. K. Gardiner : History of England, I, p. 7. 2 gee p. 81.

DEPRESSION OF POWER OF PARLIAMENT. 99

entered zealously upon a reactionary course, it be-
came at once apparent that the spirit of the nation
was not dead. Once more the prompt men of Kent,
descendants of the ceorls who had formed wyatt'sre-
the vanguard of Harold at Hastings, and '•*"'™-
of the poor, plain men who followed Wat Tyler to
Smithfield and Jack Cade to London Stone, thronged
after Sir Thomas Wyatt, out of their tithings as far
as Temple Bar, in formidable rebellion. Wyatt's
rebellion failed, and its leader was beheaded, but it
was not without effect. The blood of many martyrs
became prolific seed, as well for a better state as a
better church. Mary's days were short; but when
Elizabeth acceded, in 1558, Protestant though she
was, she found in the people a temper quite different
from that which her father had known. Not only
Mary Tudor and Philip, but Mary Stuart, also, were
promoters of Anglo-Saxon freedom. The struggle
with Catholicism forced Elizabeth to have more fre-
quent recourse to Parliament ; and as she was driven
to appeal for increasing supplies, the tone increasing
of the Houses rose higher and higher. Een/mfder
The Commons were not now satisfied to ^'"*''®*-
restrict or help the Sovereign, but assumed to dictate
a policy. Elizabeth angrily charged them with act-
ing like rebels, with dealing with her as they dared
not have dealt with her father. To the Spanish am-
bassador she said, " I cannot tell what these devils
want." "They want liberty, Madame," said the
Spaniard ; " and if princes do not look to themselves,
and work together to put such people down, they
will find before long what all this is coming to."
Parliament was now fully conscious that it stood

100 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

for the people, as appears from the declaration of Sir

Thomas Smith : " Every Englishman is intended to

be there present either in person, or by

smiih'Bde- procuration and attorney, — of what pre-
scription. -^ ,

eminence, state, dignity, or quality soever

he be, — from the prince, be he King or Queen, to the
lowest person in England; and the consent of Par-
liament is taken to be every man's consent." ^ Eliz-
abeth, however, followed as closely as she could in
the footsteps of her father. By natural temper the
Tudors were more arbitrary than the Plantagenets ;
and had a standing army been at their disposal the
utter destruction of liberty might have come.^ Eliz-
Tact of the abcth, like Henry, though easily roused to
-w^rath and full of arrogance, was yet sin-
cerely patriotic, possessed tact and an excellent gift in
choosing good men for office, to whom she was gen-
erally faithful. Cecil's management was prudent,
economical, benevolent, in fact, almost motherly,^ in
its care for all classes. She asked for very few sub-
sidies, and in every conflict with the parliamentary
right to legislate and tax, though she might storm
and swear, she at last yielded.

The main laws of Elizabeth's system were the
Act of Supremacy and the Act of Uniformity, laws
in the worst possible odor with writers
premacyand in Sympathy witli the struggle for free-
dom, and whose purport, on account of
the important part they have in the history of the

1 Quoted ty Stubbs, III, p. 468; for other similar assertions, see
Taswell-Langmead : English Constitutional History, p. 484, etc.

2 Macaulay : History of England, I, p. 31.
8 " Miitterlich," Gneist, p. 213, etc.

DEPKESSION OF POWER OP PARLIAMENT. 101

succeeding century, must be carefully pondered.
Though they tended strongly toward despotism, their
enactment by a Parliament in which the sentiment
of liberty was well alive, is quite explicable. By
the Act of Supremacy, all spiritual or eccl'esiastical
law-giving was declared to flow out from the Throne,
and an oath acknowledging this was required of
every subject. By the Act of Uniformity, Church
ritual and discipline throughout were also subjected
to the Throne. Bishops held their places only
during the Sovereign's pleasure. The bitterness of
the strife with Rome made this absolutism possible ;
the nation so dreaded a return of the days of Mary,
that it acquiesced in the assumption, by Protestant
hands which it could trust, of an unlimited spiritual
sway. But the arbitrariness soon began to encroach
upon the secular domain.

The instruments for making the increased royal
power more effective were the Star Chamber and
High Commission Courts. An innovation ^^^ chamber
into the constitution, fitfully apparent dur- commlsion
ing the later middle ages, but becoming '^'""''^•
fixed under the Tudors, was the Privy Council, a
pure outcome of the royal will. Under Henry VIII
it consisted of fourteen state and court officials,
among them four peers and two bishops. The Court
of Star Chamber, so-called from its place of meeting
at Westminster, was a committee of the Privy Coun-
cil appointed to deal with secular affairs. The power
of this court tended constantly to become greater;
but though quite unauthorized by the nation's voice
and responsible to no one but the Sovereign, it was at
first negligently suffered. In Elizabeth's day, it was

102 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

especially fearful to evil-doers high in station, and
therefore for a long time popular. Usually it was
impartial, disposed to protect the poor and oppressed,
— with one important exception, however, when the
person or passions of the Monarch came in ques-
tion. The High Commission Court was a committee
charged with spiritual cases. Here, too, the irre-
sponsible power tended to become absolute. The
Court differed from the Romish inquisition only
in having a milder code of punishments and a less
violent method. Its arbitrariness was overlooked in
the stress of the conflict with the dreaded religious
foe outside, against which it was often an effective
engine. These two committees, unauthorized by the
Parliament, which had grown weak and negligent,
became before long apparently irresistible. Publicity
was excluded in their proceedings ; torture was some-
times resorted to. How the Star Chamber and High
Commission Courts were at length challenged and
finally swept away must be told hereafter.

The return to arbitrary rule under the Tudors was
not complete, then. Why it proceeded as far as it
Absolutism ^^^ "^® ^^^ casily Understand. The disor-
under'th^Tu- ^^^'^ of the fourteenth century had wrecked
''°"" the ancient Baronage and greatly injured

the people at large. In England the Reformation
helped the royal power. The sleep of the nation was
promoted by the general popularity of Henry VIII,
of Edward VI, and of Elizabeth, which was marked,
in spite of their faults ; — by the substantial wisdom,
moreover, with which they used their absolutism,
steering skilfully the ship of state in the most diffi-
cult seas. Even in Elizabeth's reign, in spite of the

DEPRESSION OF POWER OF PARLIAMENT. 103

danger imminent from the Star Chamber and High
Commission Courts, the House of Commons made
gains. Step by step it won the freedom of its mem-
bers from arrest, save by its own permission; the
privilege of punishing and driving out members for
crimes committed within its walls ; of determining all
matters relating to elections. The more important
claim for freedom from arrest for words spoken in
debate was not fully gained, Sir Philip Wentworth,
its most prominent champion, seeing in consequence
the walls of a dungeon. Two years before the
Queen's death, the bill for the abolition of monopo-
lies passed, which put an end to great abuses, the
Queen opposing with her usual temper, but yielding
at last with her usual tact.

As regards the power of the people, the sixteenth
century was throughout Europe a time of misfortune.
In Spain, Charles V and Philip II over- its triumph
threw the cortes ; in Germany, the desper- Spo'n The con-
ate struggle of the peasants for a better '™™'"
condition proved utterly abortive ; in France, the
authority of the States-General dwindled, and early in
the seventeenth century the long intermission of their
sessions began which ended only with the Revolution
in 1789. Holland, indeed, fought its way through
to a measure of freedom ; and in England, though
Tudor absolutism seemed to have superseded all
other rule, the spirit of the nation was not dead.
Before long, there was to be a memorable revival of
that spirit, but things were destined to grow worse
before they grew better.

The drift toward arbitrary rule, which dated from
the downfall of the Lauisastrian line, and so had

104 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

lasted a century and a half, went far. The doctrine,
however, of lemtimacy and hereditary right

Growth of the i m tx i i i

doctrine of grcw Very gradually. it naa become
strong enough even in the first half of the
fifteenth century to cause men to feel great compunc-
tion on account of the deposition of Richard II, and
prepared the way, as we have seen, for the accession
of Edward IV, with no title to the throne but birth.
During the Tudor period the doctrine became slowly
confirmed. When a new line succeeds, with the
death of Elizabeth in 1603, we are confronted at
once with statements more extreme than ever before,
and of evil augury to Anglo-Saxon freedom.

A book called Cowell's " Interpreter " declared that
the King is above law by his absolute power ; that,
coweirs "In- "notwithstanding his oath, he might alter
terpreter." ^^^ suspcud any particular law that seem-
eth hurtful to the public estate. . . . He is above the
law by his absolute power ; and though for the better
and equal course in making laws he do admit the
three estates into Council, yet this in divers learned
men's opinions is not of constraint, but of his own
benignity, or by reason of the promise made upon
oath at the time of his coronation." ^ Convocation,
the assembled body of the clergy, in 1606,

Subserviency . i . j- n /in t

ofConvooa- m cauous kept careiullv secret, declared,

tion and the n n . i i.

University of (alter denouncmg " the fatal error that all

Oxford. \ . ...

civil power, jurisdiction, and authority were
first derived from the people and disordered multi-
tude, or either is originally still in them, or else is de-
duced by their consent naturally from them and is not

1 Ransome i Rise of Constitutional Government in England, p. 121.
T^iswell-Langmead, p. 502.

DEPRESSION OF POWER OF PARLIAMENT. 105

God's ordinance originally descending from him and
depending upon him,") that " sovereignty is the pre-
rogative of birthright," and inculcated in the schools
and everywhere passive obedience to the Crown as a
religious obligation. The University of Oxford de-
clared before James' death : " It was in no case law-
ful for subjects to make use of force against their
princes, or to appear offensively or defensively in the
field against them " ; and James himself, after laying
down in " The True Law of a Free Mon- (j,^j^g ^j
archy " the principle that the sovereign was •'^""^ ^•
responsible only to his own royal will, said : " As it
is atheism and blasphemy to dispute what God can
do, so it is presumption and a high contempt in a
subject to dispute what a King can do, or to say that
a King cannot do this and that." ^

The Plantagenets and Tudors were rulers full of
masterful qualities. The Stuarts, on the other hand,
were quite incompetent to the situation in which
they found themselves. The feeling of royal obli-
gation to bring to pass good for their subjects,
weighed upon them but slightly. They were pre-
pared to sacrifice the honor and welfare of the
country for personal ends. They were never in
upright relations with the Church, unfaithful to
oaths which they had sworn, relentlessly unforgiv-
ing, possessed of no talent as generals or politicians.
The Stuarts, however, evoked a degree of loyalty
from their subjects, even from the wisest and noblest
among them, such as the Plantagenets and even the
Tudors had never been able to call out. This was
due to the growth of the doctrine of the divine right.
1 Green : History of the English People, III, p. 72.

106 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

James I, his son and grandsons, were without doubt
heirs of William the Conqueror, indeed, of Saxon
Egbert. Whether the nation elected and recognized
them or not, after the venerable form, was, according
to the new theory, a matter of indifference : by right
of birth alone, they claimed, and a great part of their
subjects supported them in the claim, that they were
Kings of England. Different though they were in
character, the Stuarts have this negative trait in
common, — a failure to understand and respect the
law of the land. Alongside of the constitution there
had arisen, through Tudor encroachment, a scheme
ready fitted to the hands of monarchs thus disposed.
Parliament was the proper law-giving body; but
side by side with this legislation stood now a system
of royal ordinances, proceeding from the Sovereign
alone. Only Parliament could legally grant money,
following the ancient right recognized by Edward I
and even in Magna Charta, that no man should be
taxed unless he were represented in the body that
imposed the tax. Now, however, there were cus-
toms, orders, fines, "tonnage and poundage," "coat
and conduct-money," "ship-money," etc., — various
ways by which a King could raise money without
recourse to the Houses. Such abuses had been
allowed to creep in in times of emergency under
the specious pretext that prompt action was some-
times thwarted, if only constitutional ways could be
employed. Precedents, however, had been estab-
lished destined to make great trouble. Most threat-
ening danger of all, by the side of the properly
constituted courts, with sheriffs, justices of the peace,
and juries, were fixed the courts of Star Chamber

DEPRESSION OF POWER OF PARLIAMENT. 107

and High Commission, with inquisition, torture, and
summary procedure of every kind. This uncon-
stitutional machinery for ruling the Stuarts pro-
ceeded to develop.

Opposition, however, at once appeared on the part
of the nation. "The slavish Parliament of Henry
VIII, which had become the murmuring opposition of
Parliament of Elizabeth, and the mutinous i'»''''^"'"'-
Parliament of James I, became, under Charles I,
the rebellious Parliament." ^ At first, feeble and
fitful, the opposition gathered force, developing
under Charles I into a stern battle between the
King and that conservative element of .

, , T , 1 J • 1 , CbarleB I and

the people who were determined to up- the Petition
hold the ancient ways. The King was
forced by the Petition of Right,^ in 1628, to admit
that his arbitrary course was wrong. It was a pro-
fession of the lips, not the heart. A grant of sub-
sidies having taken place as a consequence of the
redress of grievances, Charles dissolved Parliament,
not intending to keep his word, and with the resolve
never to summon another Parliament. He was
"ashamed that his cousins of France and Spain
should have completed a work which he had
scarcely begun." He commenced in March, 1629,
a system of personal rule quite new in England,
which continued for eleven years, during which
time the people were not summoned to Westminster
by their delegates. Never before since Earl Simon's
time had the voice of the people been silenced for
such an interval ; only once before had there been

1 Bagehot : English Constitution, p. 281.

2 For the full text, see Appendix B.

108 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

an interval of half that length. His two main
Laud straf- ^gents and advisers were Laud, Arch-
poHcy''of ""^ bishop of Canterbury, and Thomas Went-
" Thorough." ^orth, Earl of Strafford ; the two engines
through which it was sought to bring to pass the
King's will, to the supersession of that of the people,
were, for spiritual affairs, the Court of High Com-
mission, for secular affairs that of Star Chamber.

In defiance of the general sentiment of England, the
reactionary Laud guided the Church, as the nation
felt, perilously near to Romanism. Transubstantia-
tion, auricular confession, preferment of celibate
priests, restoration of image worship, adoration of the
crucifix, minute attention to vestments, genuflections,
vigils, pilgrimages, — ■ these, once discarded, were now
revived. At the same time there sat at the King's
right hand as Queen, the Catholic Henrietta of
France, daughter of Henry IV, a princess inheriting
her father's courage,-'enterprise, and wit, but drawing
from her mother, Maria de' Medici, an Italian dex-
terity in intrigue, subservience to priestly advisers,
and a complete devotion to the Church of Rome.

In secular matters, at the same time, the monarch's
hand was carried ever higher and higher. It was no
longer a series of isolated, arbitrary acts that the citi-
zen beheld ; but Laud and Strafford, pushing ever more
strongly, developed the policy known as " Thorough,"
— a consistent, energetic system of rule going directly
against popular liberty, even to the last bulwark, the
right of taxation. In all points but one the govern-
ment of England had become as despotic as that of
France and Spain : as yet the King had at his com-
mand no standing army. Should this one obstacle

DEPRESSION OF POWER OF PARLIAMENT. 109

block the path ? It was resolved that such an army
might be, and to meet the cost, recourse
was to be had to ship-money. In former 'P-'"°°^y-
times, to meet foreign dangers, the Kings had exacted
of the Cinque Ports and the maritime counties the
maiutaining of ships of war. Acting on these pre-
cedents, Charles now sought to levy a general tax,
nominally ship-money, but the yield of which might
be applied to any use. With this word, so memor-
able in the history of English-speaking men, let us
turn aside for a while from the tale of the . mad race
of the Stuarts toward absolutism. Anglo-Saxon free-
dom was on the point of perishing. Precisely now,
in the nick of time, became operative in its behalf a
force from America, — a force at first scarcely trace-
able, but destined in time to grow momentous.

110 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA.

1607-1700.

HoKACB Walpole, an important figure in Eng-
land in the eighteenth century, when the news of
Burgoyne's surrender at Saratoga reached England,
wrote to the Countess of Ossory, December 11, 1777 :
" Well, Madame, as I told Lord Ossory the other
day, I am satisfied. Old England is safe, that is
America, — ^ whither the true English retired under
Charles I." ^ What reason is there in such a state-
ment as this ? Horace Walpole asserts that America
was more English than England herself, the true
English having retired to America under Charles I.

Just at the hour when the Tudors were giving

place to the Stuarts, two events took place within

about six years of each other, at the time

Charters of ^^^. iti -it

the East In- regarded as having the slightest possible

diaandVir- . .„ j- i • i i ,

giniaCompa- Significance, 01 which however the conse-
quences have been of transcendent impor-
tance- in the history of the world. These events
were the granting of charters to two commercial
companies, the one designing to engage in mercantile
operations in the East Indies ; the other, looking for
its field of operations to the coast of America. The

1 Walpole's Letters.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. Ill

first of these charters, granted December 31, 1600,
was the foundation of the vast Asiatic empire of
England; the second, granted April 10, 1606, the
foundation of America. With those charters began
the diffusion of the English language, institutions,
and influence beyond the narrow bounds of the little
island of Britain to the four quarters of the earth.

In 1607, a colony with no higher purpose than the
establishment of a trading enterprise that might be
lucrative, fixed itself at Jamestown in Vir- settlement of
ginia. In the heterogeneous company J*""^"'^''-
were few or none actuated by any high principle.
A considerable part of those who came in the first
years came not of their own free-will, but were de-
ported from England as idlers or, indeed, convicts,
of whom the mother-country might conveniently in
this way rid herself. In the case of the better class
of settlers, who came of their own free-will, the
motive for emigration was certainly not discontent
with the political or religious conditions at home.
They desired simply to make money, aiid saw in the
fur trade, the mines, the agriculture, which they
hoped to be able to develop in the new world, a
better opportunity for gain than was offered to them
elsewhere. With no grievance as to either Church
or State, conforming without a murmur to what both
demanded, they gave their energies to carrying out
schemes of piaterial profit.

Far more interesting in connection with the history
of Anglo-Saxon freedom, was the body of settlers,
who, under "the new charter, presently ^^„

' ^ r J Of Plymouth.

came to occupy the country farther to the
north.

112 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

" Give praise to others, early come or late,
For love and labor on our ship of state.
But this must stand above all fame and zeal :
The PUgrim Tathers laid the ribs and keel.
On their strong lines we base our social health —
The man — the home — the town — the Commonwealth. ' ' i

At the time when the Jamestown settlers were
gaming their foothold, a group of men and women
belonging to a sect known as Separatists, dwelling in
Lincolnshire, in the east of England, were under-
going persecution. Their station in life was that of
yeomen, the lower middle class, below the gentry,
but still free-holders, — the class to which belonged
the tradesmen of the towns and the small farmers
who then abounded throughout the country. To
the Separatists a faith simpler and less formal than
the prevailing Anglicanism was congenial, and in
the effort to cherish such a faith they found the
hand of the established Church heavy upon them.
Through peril and hardship a small band of them
made their way to Holland, where, for a decade,
under the ministrations of John Robinson, one of
the memorable representatives of the spirit of free
thought, a spirit which at this time was beginning to
stir in the world, they worshipped God not as the
bishops prescribed, but as their own consciences dic-
tated. But Holland was not to their mind, and in
1620 came, at Delfthaven, the famous embarkation,
of which the result was the establishment of New
England.

As regards the establishment of the Pilgrims at
Plymouth, the thing of interest to notice in connec-

1 J. Boyle O'Eeilly : Poem at Plymouth, August 1, 1889.

THE SETTLEMENT OP AMERICA. 113

tion with the present subject is that politically they
did not reproduce the state of thing's they

^ o ./ Revival in

had left behind ; nor, on the other hand, did New BngiaDd

of the ancient

they invent something new. In the his- Angio-Saxon
tory of the English-speaking race, the wise
reformers have been the true conservatives. True
conservatives were the Pilgrim Fathers; for in the
society which they set up, they went back to old ways
which in England itself had been largely forsaken.

In the earlier part of our study of Anglo-Saxon in-
stitutions, we were much concerned with the tun-
scipe, the fenced village within which submergence
dwelt the community of ceorls, — the J," the popular
house of the setheling rising among the °'°°'*'
humbler homesteads, the huts of l^ts and theows ad-
jacent, the place for the moot in the centre, beyond
the paling or mound the allotments of plough-land
and grass-land, and encircling ^11, the common waste.
The tun-scipe was the unit of political organization ;
an aggregation of them formed the hundred or wapen-
take ; an aggregation of hundreds in turn formed the
shire ; the shires combined at last into the kingdom.
As we come down the centuries, the name township
gradually retires, the term parish taking its place ;
a term denoting the same thing, but bringing into
view the ecclesiastical side of the organization, which,
through the zeal of the mediaeval churchmen, played
a large part in the lives of men.i As early as the
thirteenth century the vestry-meeting becomes appar-
ent, — a tun-moot for church purposes, in which even
villeins can join. Matters secular soon come to be

1 Howard : Introduction to Local Constitutional History of the United
States, I, p. 31, etc.

114 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

discussed in the vestry-meetings; the lay attributes
predominate more and more. When at last the
Stuart day is reached, the parish with its vestry has
largely superseded the township with its moot. The
vestry-meeting provides fully for matters temporal as
well as spiritual, and it is, moreover, to be noticed that
it is often beginning to lose its original democratic
character. We have seen the boroughs fall into the
hands of close corporations ; ■• in a similar way the
country parishes begin to fall into the hands of select
vestries, small knots of men forming close corpora-
tions, who establish oligarchies in place of the rule
of the people, at the very fountain-head.

While the township was thus changing, the shire,
too, was becoming greatly modified. As far back as
the reign of Edward III certain statutes prescribe
" that there shall be good and lawful men in every
county to keep the peace." A few years later,
" what sort of persons shall be justices of the peace,
and what authority they shall have," are set down,
the decree enacting that there " shall be one lord,
and with him three or four of the most worthy in the
county, with some learned in the law." Here in
shadowy outline can be made out the incipient insti-
tution, the Court of Quarter Sessions, which in the
Stuart time, three hundred years later, had taken
from the shire-moot all judicial and administrative
character, leaving to it only its elective functions.
The lord-lieutenant of the county, who appears in
the Tudor day as head of the military organization,
was an appointee of the Crown ; so, too, the justices
of the Quarter Sessions, who, four times a year, held

1 See p. 66.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. 115

courts for criminal jurisdiction, and provided also for
the management of roads, of the poor, and for the
assessing and collecting of taxes; such, moreover,
the ancient sheriff had become. The shire-moot sur-
vived only as the occasion when the free-holders,
assembling, voted for coroner, an official of higher
dignity than at present ; for verderer, a functionary
charged with the management of the forests; and,
most important of all, for the knight-of-the-shire, who
should speak for them in Parliament. This was the
local self-government which the first English settlers
in America had known. This, however, the New
Englanders did not reproduce.

The little company of poor men had signed the
compact in the cabin of the " Mayflower," to be mutu-
ally bound by laws which all were to have uethods of
a voice in framing, had explored for a lit- menunilew*'
tie ; then, after setting foot on the lonely ^"s^"^-
boulder which now seems almost likely to be worn
away by the reverent 'trampling of the multitudes
who visit it, had built their camp-fires at last where
sweet water gushed freely from the bosom of a hill.^
They felt forgotten by the world. Doing what was
easiest to be done, following traditions which, so to
speak, had come down in their blood, they set apart
certain land to be held in common, a homestead for
each man, built a fort of timber on the hill close by,
ran their palisade where danger seemed most to
threaten, established certain simple rules, and, lo,
when all was done, the little settlement was through-

>■ Johns Hopkins Historical and Political Studies, 2d Series, IV. The
writer adapts here a page or two from a previous monograph oi his
own.

116 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

out, as to internal constitution and external features,
essentially the same as an Anglo-Saxon "tun" or
" burh," sucli as a boat-load of the followers of Hen-
gist or Cerdie might have set up, as they coasted
searching for a home along the isle of Thanet, — or
further back still, the same essentially as a village of
the Weser shore or the Odenwald, set up in the
primeval heathen days.^ To the settlement, they
applied the old name of tun or town.

When, ten years later, Winthrop with his Puritan
followers came to settle Boston, they were richer,
more numerous, better educated, but it was conven-
ient for them, too, to go back to the old forms. Ship
followed ship, almost unnoticed in the old world,
where the minds of men were absorbed in the strug-
gle between King and Parliament, which presently
burst into war. Twenty-one thousand, at length,
sailing toward the beckoning finger of Cape Cod, had
found a refuge in Massachusetts Bay. They spread
from the coast into the interior, through blazed paths
of the forest, led by Indian guides to rich intervales in
distant valleys, — clustering about water-falls where
fish abounded and where the grain could be ground,
or in spots where there seemed a chance for mining.
Everywhere appeared the house-lots or viUage-mark ;
the plough-land, the meadow, the pasture temporarily
allotted ; and the undivided common waste.^ "What de-
termined the size of the towns was always convenience
in getting to the Sunday meeting ; for to church all

1 Edward A. .Freeman : Introduction to American Institutional His-
tory, p. 15. Herbert B. Adams : Germanic Origin of New England
Towns. Johns Hopliins Historical and Political Studies, 1st Series,

i,n.

2 Howard : Local Constitutional History, I, p. 53.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. 117

were obliged to go under penalty of fine or severe pun-
ishment. Left to themselves, each group of inhabi-
tants thus bound together about the meeting-house,
near which also was generally placed the school, con-
trived for the regulation of affairs which interested all
alike the forms which came most handy, and these
were the folk-moot with its accompaniments, The town-
the local self-government of Anglo-Saxon "^^''''s-
days, revived with a faithfulness of which the colonists
themselves were not at all conscious. For twenty
years Plymouth had a folk-moot for its entire jurisdic-
tion, open to every freeman. The restriction which in
the colony of Massachusetts Bay admitted only church-
members to the franchise, was at last abrogated, so
that there, too, every reputable citizen had a right
to vote. To cast a glance ahead, in a century and a
half, Massachusetts, absorbing Plymouth and holding
possession of Maine, contained more than two hun-
dred towns. In New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and
Connecticut, the population was similarly apportioned
into townships, whose constitution is thus described
by a writer of the time : " Every town is an incorpo-
rated republic. The selectmen by their own author-
ity, or upon the application of a certain number of
townsmen, issue a warrant for the calling of a town-
meeting. The warrant mentions the business to be
engaged in, and no other can be legally executed.
The inhabitants are warned to attend ; and they that
are present, though not a quarter or tenth of the
whole, have a right to proceed. They choose a presi-
dent by the name of Moderator, who regulates the
proceedings of the meeting. Each individual has an
equal liberty of delivering his opinion, and is not

118 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

liable to be silenced or browbeaten by a richer or
greater townsman than himself. Every freeman or
free-holder gives his vote or not, and for or against,
as he pleases ; and each vote weighs equally, whether
that of the highest or lowest inhabitant. . . . All
the New England towns are on the same plan in gen-
eral."^ "A New England town-meeting," says Free-
man, "is essentially the same as the folk-moot."^

Of the forms of organization above the town, the
hundred was never reproduced in New England at
all, while the shire or county, though reproduced,
never acquired the importance which it had in the
mother-land. At first the towns suificed ; the coun-
ties did not appear in Massachusetts Bay until 1643,
while elsewhere there was still longer delay, Rhode
Island first adopting shires in 1703. They had little
significance, except as judicial districts, the courts
being modelled after the English Quarter Sessions.
The venerable shire-moot, still persisting in England
as the -centre of political life, the assembly at which
were elected the representative knights and certain
local ofiicials, though most of its judicial and adminis-
trative functions had long been lost, never appeared
in New England.

"What was the course of development in Virginia,
the great colony which presently grew out of the
Reproduction little Settlement at Jamestown, becoming
eo^imp"o'?a?y ^^^ representative colony of the South as
England. Massachusctts soou became that of the

1 Gordon: History of Independence of United States, I, p. 262.

2 American Institutional History, Johns Hopkins Historical and Polit-
ical Series, 1, 1, p. 16.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. 119

North? As Virginia took shape, her institutions
were no less thoroughly English than those of Massa-
chusetts, and yet they were not the same as those of
Massachusetts. While in the case of New England
the settlers reverted to a state of things so primitive,
Virginia, on the other hand, reproduced the forms
which actually existed at home contemporaneously
with her settlement.^ First, we find as

. _ . .11 T ^^^ parish.

early as Ibdl the name parish ; the earlier
" plantations " had no doubt been de facto parishes,
and afterward the counties were regularly subdivided
into them. Here, as at home, the vestry had chief
authority, composed usually of twelve " of the most
sufficient and selected men," who soon became, after
the home precedent, a close corporation for the dis-
charge of functions both ecclesiastical and civil. Here
the clergyman presided as first in dignity (another Eng-
lish practice), whose salary was yearly sixteen thou-
sand pounds of tobacco. On the whole, the Virginia
vestries, though aristocratic in form, were fairly wise
and moderate, and usuallj'- sustained by the people,
though the people had no voice in choosing them. So
great a democrat as Jefferson testifies in their favor :
in early days when the royal governor tried to force
upon the parishes his own nominees, an active resist-
ance was made, and in the bickering back and forth
the way was prepared for the events of 1776.^

But though the parish performed many important
functions, it was early overshadowed by „,

•' . 11-1 The county.

the county, which possessed all the higher

IE. A. Freeman: American Institutional History, Johns Hopkins
University Studies, 1st Series, 1, p. 17.

2 Howard : Local Constitutional Government of the United States, I,
p. 118, etc.

120 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

offices of local self-government and was as well the
unit of representation and administration. This, too,
was a reproduction of a contemporary English organi-
zation. Though the first settlers had adopted the
village community, economic causes brought it about
that the later organization was soon adopted; for
everything tended to plantation rather than town life.
As early as 1634, eight shires appear, " governed as
the shires in England," which become seventy-four by
the time of the American Revolution. The Courts

of Quarter Sessions appear duly in all
Quarter Sea- thcsc, composcd of justices appointed by

the royal governor. The board of justices
in each shire has the privilege of nominating to the
governor the appointees; and it therefore results that
the county court, like the parish vestry, becomes a
close corporation composed of the leading gentry.^
The justices assume all functions, judicial and admin-
istrative. The only approach to a democratic feature
in the aristocratic polity is the manner of electing the
burgesses, the members who sit in the colonial assem-
bly, and who constitute with a royal council nomi-
nated by the Crown, and a Crown-appointed governor
possessed of a veto power, the central government.
As the colony becomes established, two burgesses sit
for each county, and these are chosen by such free-
holders as have an estate for life in one hundred acres
of uninhabited land, or in twenty-five acres with a
house on it, or in a house or lot in some town. With
so high a property qualification, very many were
Scene at a disfranchised, but we may discern here a
county court. fgg^^^i,g jjj gome measure popular. The

1 Howard : Local Constitutional Government of the U. S., I, p. 388, etc.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. 121

elections took place in presence of the sheriff (who
was either himself a justice or an appointee of the
justices), at the county court, the people coming
together in shire-moot, for the purpose, after the
fashion not yet obsolete in England. Crippled
though the power of the people was, still the Vir-
ginian court-day in the old time must have presented
a democratic aspect. It was a holiday for the whole
country-side, especially in the fall and spring. The
people came generally on horseback, on foot, in
wagons. In the great assembly on the court-house
green, hunters, small farmers, great proprietors, grin-
ning negroes, mingled freely together. Old debts
were settled, new debts contracted; the auctioneer
and the peddler plied busily their vocations. If an
election was pending, every convenient stump pedes-
talled its orator. In a measure, the county court took
the place of the town-meeting: like the town-meeting
it exercised a powerful levelling influence, and was
in a way, by no means ineffective, a training-school
for the republican life which lay in the future.^

That New England and Virginia should have
adopted institutions so widely different is quite expli-
cable. New England, while containing a Reasons for

1* (. -T j> j_iii 1 • .the contrast

few families of gentle blood, was in vast between New
majority settled by yeomen, the lower mid- vifgfnia.*The
die class, to which belonged in Old England tiers of the
the traders and small farmers. It was in
this class that the Anglo-Saxon strain ran purest, with
least of Norman intermixture. To such men, primi-
tive ways were most likely to be congenial ; to such

1 Hannis Taylor: Origin and Growth of English Constitution, I, 39.

122 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

men, also, primitive ways were most likely to be
familiar. The public life, which these humble people
knew for the most part, was that of the small neigh-
borhoods where the tun-moot was not as yet quite
dead; for it was precisely here that ancient usages
clung most tenaciously. " The smaller and more
decidedly differentiated the institution, the less the
liability to change, modification, or substitution."^
When left to themselves, it was natural that, follow-
ing tendencies which had come down in their blood,
they should adopt and at the same time strengthen
what remained of the ancient features of Anglo-
Saxon freedom. It was presently found that what
nature suggested in the way of forms of polity was
admirably fitted for the life into which the circum-
stances of their new home forced the colonists. Hence,
it is easy to understand why the resuscitated govern-
ment by popular moot came soon to manifest the
greatest vigor.

In Virginia, on the other hand, the yeoman element
was small. At the top of society was an aristocracy

of rich proprietors holding large estates,
piantei-B of allied through similarity of condition, and

through ties of blood also, with the landed
gentry of the mother-country. The law of primo-
geniture being rigidly maintained, each great estate,
consisting often of thousands of acres, descended
in each generation to the eldest son, his brothers
and sisters being slightly portioned, if at all. There
were, indeed, small farmers, a class springing in
part from unportioned younger sons, in part from
later immigrants, who were at a disadvantage as to

1 Phelan : History of Tennessee, p. 203.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. 123

getting hold of the soil: this class, however, was
uuimportant as compared with the landed magnates,
with whom lay all social prestige and, for the most
part, political power. The particular form into
which society in Virginia arranged itself, was much
affected by the special industry to which The slaves.
the colony became almost exclusively devoted, the
raising of tobacco. On the great estates the labori-
ous process of producing the invariable crop could be
most conveniently left to the hands of negroes. Every-
thing favored the development of slavery, and slaves
soon came to make up nearly half of the population.
In a condition not very different from that of the
slayes were the indentured white servants. These
were penniless immigrants, sometimes English con-
victs or paupers, shipped to the New World ^j,g
and bound out for a term of years by the ■"'^''*^-
government; sometimes people of more respectable
antecedents, who in return for their passage-money
freely gave themselves into practical serfdom. In
these circumstances, labor necessarily fell Di„epme of
into disrepute : a class of poor whites arose, '*''°'-
descendants of those so unfortunately placed as to be
unable to obtain land or of those who lacked energy
to do so, who squatted on the plantations in out-of-
the-way swamps or woods, pushed into the wilderness
as hunters and trappers, or tramped as roving vaga-
bonds from estate to estate. Such town-life as that
of New England would, of course, in a society so sit-
uated, be impossible. The parish would necessarily
be a feeble substitute for it. The inhabitants were
scattered throughout the vast counties with no rally-
ing-points but the manor-house of the planters. Of

124 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

manufacturing of any kind there was no trace, and
the class of honorable merchants was almost unknown.
It was indispensable to each great plantation that it
should be accessible from the sea, a condition easily
supplied through the magniiicent streams which af-
forded paths everywhere into the interior from the
Chesapeake. Each planter had his own wharf and
warehouse, to which his negroes brought yearly at
harvest the great tobacco-yield, while English or
Yankee ships, freighted with foreign manufactures
to be given in exchange, lay ready to receive it.

The typical Virginian, as the colony developed,
was devoted to the English King and Church. If he
possessed overweening family pride, extravagance,
and contempt for work, he had also the splendid
Virtues of the virtucs of a cavalicr class, — generosity,

Virginia ho- ^-. _,^

ciety. bravery, and hospitality. Even the poor

whites, forlorn as they were for all purposes of
peaceful, well-ordered society, possessed qualities
which fitted them admirably to be frontiersmen and
soldiers. Many a planter could claim descent from
historic stock ; and sometimes, as in the case of the
old Lord Fairfax, who established for himself a broad
sylvan domain in the valley of the Shenandoah, and
lived there like the banished Duke of " As You Like
It," in the " Forest of Arden," the blood of the Vir-
ginians was of the noblest.

Since, then, the isolation of the great estates at the
South made it out of the question for the men to
come together as in the compact communities of the
North, and since, moreover, the more heterogeneous
character of society in the former case interfered
with the disposition to come together, — instead of a

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. 125

State made up of small democratic communities, within
each one of which the men, gathered in town-meeting,
governed themselves, a State came to pass, the people
of which had little opportunity or desire for the gen-
eral discussion of public measures. Care for political
matters was, in the mass of men, very slight, from
the fact that a class small in number almost monopo-
lized property and power. The territorial magnates
were all-in-all. In the House of Burgesses spirit of the

1 House of

at Williamsburg, the great planters came Burgesses.
together, and few besides. Among them, indeed,
political interest was keen enough. Each had a great
stake in the country ; each was accustomed to power
and fond of wielding it. In this aristocratic legisla-
ture the energy was marked, and the spirit of free-
dom very manifest. The royal governors found the
body often intractable ; constant bickering prevailed
between them and the assembly, through which the
latter learned the habit of calling into question the
authority of the King, and also came to love an at-
mosphere of strife.

There was not only no proper popular moot in Vir-
ginia, but in the colonies of the South and Southwest
generally, as they became gradually established, it did
not appear. As a definite polity shaped itself, there
were in the case of each one peculiarities of constitu-
tion, but into these we do not need to enter. In South
Carolina, the parish possessed a somewhat vigorous
life ; in Maryland, under the feudal sway condition of
of the proprietary government of Lord Bal- nn" MdMaiy-
timore, the manners of mediaeval times to '''°'''
some extent appeared : in general, however, Virginia
was the type of all.

126 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

If we glance at the middle colonies, in New York
the Dutch were long enough in possession to stamp
Fcndaiism in ^V°^ *^® Settlement an impress not at all
fnTpInneyi- democratic. Along the Hudson the pa-
vania. troous, on their estates fronting sixteen

miles on the river and running back indefinitely, had
set up a feudalism as marked as that of the seigneuries
which the French at the same time established on the
St. Lawrence. On Long Island and the shore near
by, there were self-governing towns quite similar to the
Connecticut Communities close at hand.^ After the
English occupation of the colony in 1664, an organi-
zation of counties with subdivisions of townships
gradually makes its way, which, in our own century,
has come to play an important part. Here, though
the town-life is faintly marked, possessing with less
distinctness than in New England the moot, yet cerr
tain functionaries exist, freely elected by the people,
the most important of whom is the supervisor; the
town supervisors, forming in each shire a board sit-
ting together at stated times, provide for the* most
part for local self-government. This is the germ of
the Township-county system, which, as will hereafter
be seen, has been very important in the settlement
of the West.^ In Pennsylvania, though the great
proprietor, Penn, was practically a viceroy beneath
an English suzerainty, exercising over a population
containing many elements besides English, a rule
which was far from favorable to democracy, yet
at one point occurred an interesting development.

1 Johns Hopkins University Studies, 1st Series, VI, VII, and XII.
Howard : Local Constitutional Government of the United States, 1, 114,
etc. "Howard, I, p. 102,- etc.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. 127

While the town was insignificant, the county appeared
with great prominence. It was the unit of represen-
tation, within which assemblies highly democratic
convened for the election of officers. These assem-
blies were, indeed, a revival of the shire-moots in form
more complete than is to be found anywhere on An-
glo-Saxon soil since the days of the Heptarchy. Next
to the Township-county system of New York, the
County system of Pennsylvania, after the ordinance
of 1787 had finally thrown open to settlement the
immense central region of America, determined
the present form of local government throughout
the great Northwest.^

So it was that the Anglo-Saxon in the seventeenth
century established himself in a new home beyond
the sea, bringing with him Anglo-Saxon freedom ;
just as in the fifth century he had established him-
self in England, bringing with him that same freedom
from the marks, hundreds, and tribes of the plains of
the Elbe and Weser. As that ancient freedom was
transferred across the wider ocean, it was by no
means unmodified. The proper primordial cell of
any Anglo-Saxon body politic is the popular moot,
the assembly of the sovereign citizens for

, .1- I. 1 1 The popular

the exercise oi srovernment oi the people, moot the pri-

° 1 /-^ mordial cell of

by the people, and for the people. Our Angio-saxon

•' r r ' ^ x ± freedom.

survey enables us to iudge the precise con- summary of

^ J ^ o X j^g condition

dition of this primordial cell among the intheThir-

■*- ^ teen Colonies.

Englishmen of the Thirteen Colonies. It

existed in the soundest and best-developed form

in the New England town-meeting. In the New

1 Howard: Local Constitutional Government in the United States,
p. 383.

128 ANGLO-SAXON FEEEDOM.

England general covirts, each deputy, in nowise
superior to those who sent him in wealth or posi-
tion, stood for the little democracy he represented,
as the humble reeve with his four associates had for
ages stood in the general court for the tithing in
which he dwelt. He was not his own master, except
in so far as his superior ability or character made his
townsmen give way to him. He was carefully in-
structed what course he must pursue ; was liable to
censure if he went against the wishes of his sharply
watching constituents ; and each year must submit
himself anew to the suffrages of his townsmen, who
promptly consigned him to private life if his course
were disapproved. While the deputy was thus closely
watched, the town-meeting took care to delegate just
as little authority as possible. It reserved to itself
all business except what it must perforce put out of
its hands, every freeman who sat in the town-hall be-
fore the moderator feeling forever upon his shoulders
the strain, so salutary and so strengthening, of the
public burden. Though in the Thii'teen Colonies
towns play little part except in New England, it
would be wrong to conclude that, for that reason,
the primordial cell in the body politic was elsewhere
wanting. Everywhere we can find the county, and
at the heart of the county is the county court. It
was largely a reproduction of the English Quarter
Sessions, to be sure, with justices appointed from
above, not elected from below ; but as side by side
with the Quarter Sessions, since its establishment in
the time of Edward III, the shire-moot had gone on,
retaining its ancient functions as an elective body ;

1 See p. 115.

THE SETTLEMENT OF AMERICA. 129

SO we can find in America, sometimes, indeed, in a
form very shadowy, but sometimes in a form very dis-
tinct, the assembly of the people to confer and to
speak their own will. It appears vaguely in Virginia,
where we have seen a portion of the people cast their
votes on county-court day, in the presence of the
sheriff, for the burgesses who are to sit at Williams-
burg. It appears very definitely in Pennsylvania.
Nowhere, probably, was the popular moot utterly
unapparent, though in many places no doubt it was
greatly attenuated. We shall note hereafter to what
extent it has been possible to revive it, and what are
its prospects for the future.

130 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER IX.

THE ENGLAND OF CHARLES I.
Charles I, 1625.

Having seen an English-speaking -world firmly-
established in the Western Hemisphere, let us no-w-
return to England to -watch the fortunes of the stock
in the old home. As has been described, an utter sub-
version of the ancient popular freedom seemed on
the point of taking place at the time of the accession
of the Stuarts. Under James I, the claims of abso-
lutism, before his time only vaguely set forth, -were
carefully formulated and published. These claims,
Charles I went to -work -with great energy to make
good. At the beginning of 1640, -when Charles had
Effort of been ruling for eleven years -without a
Sie'wfthouta Parliament, King and people are found
Parliament, locked in a fierce wrestle; for the people,
roused from an apathy that had lasted since the fall
of the Lancastrians, nearly two hundred years before,
had been stung into vigorous opposition by the en-
croachments of tyrannical princes utterly without
tact. Charles, at war with the Scotch, upon whom
he had undertaken to force a form of worship to the
last degree repugnant to them, found his resources

THE ENGLAND OF CHARLES I. 131

quite inadequate to the situation, even though the
judges had sanctioned ship-money, and was forced at
last to summon Parliament in hope of a subsidy.
The members of this Parliament, the " Short Parlia-
ment," took their places upon the benches ^^^ g^^^^^
of Westminster, so long empty, quite Pafi'^mem.
strange to legislative work. In the long intermission,
the longest which had occurred since Parliament
began, even methods of procedure had been to a
large extent forgotten. There were a few veterans,
however, who had fought on the floor of St. Stephen's
in the days of Sir John Eliot and the Petition of
Right, and these served as instructors. Particularly
conspicuous in this capacity were Pym and Hampden.
Both Houses were apt pupils. As to what was the
right course, neither Lords nor Commons had any
doubt ; and before three weeks had passed, the King,
disheartened at the stern demand for a redress of
grievances before a grant of money should be made,
put an end to the session. Necessity, however,
pressed. His ill-appointed, demoralized forces fled
before the Scotch at the skirmish of Newburn, in the
summer. No other issue being possible, the writs
were issued again, and in November, 1640, convened
that memorable Parliament, whose history Assembling
was not to end until nearly twenty years pj^i^mtat.
had passed, — the " Long Parliament."

The temper of the Long Parliament was most stub-
born, and it showed from the first the soundest Eng-
lish courage in carrying out its purpose. Before the
King could have help from the nation, a number of
innovations upon time-honored constitutional ways
must come to an end, and a swarm of evil advisers

132 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

must be dismissed and brought to judgment. As yet,
Attempts to ^heie was no whisper of any polity except
"brium bL"'' that which had come up in England in
SrdB.fnd^' feudal times, — in which the people were
oommonB. ^^j jio mcaus Sovereign as in the Anglo-
Saxon freedom, but stood co-ordinate with the King,
and a privileged class, — possessing a voice in the gov-
ernment, but far from being supreme ; in this system,
the balance had been disturbed by the effort of the
monarch to arrogate all substantial power to himself.
Both Houses were equally zealous to restore the
ancient equilibrium, lost since the Wars of the Roses.
Both Houses were firm in declaring that England
must be for Englishmen ; foreign money, foreign
armies, must play no part in English affairs ; above
all, the terrible potentate, whose yoke had been thrown
off a hundred years before, but who sat forever sleep-
less upon the distant Seven Hills, was a personage
abhorrent.

At once after the assembling. Laud and Strafford,
the leaders of the King's administration, the chief

directors of the courts of High Commission
Laud and and Star Chamber, were taken from the

right hand of Charles and thrown into dun-
geons ; while frowns so sinister were bent upon Hen-
rietta, the Catholic Queen, that fears were entertained
of her being torn to pieces in the street. Strafford
atoned at the block for his effort to play in England
the part of a Richelieu; his allies in promoting an
arbitrary policy, fled for the most part beyond the
sea; Laud, in the Tower, awaited the axe, while the
ecclesiasticism of which he had been the type and
spokesman was proscribed.

THE ENGLAND OF CHARLES I. 133

Charles for the time showed prudence: he won
friends among the Scotch Covenanters by pretending a
spirit of concession; he bent before the storm of reform
which raged in his southern kingdom ; he appeared on
the point of gaining the advantage, for to many in
the nation the fierce rush of Parliament toward a new
order began to seem extreme and dangerous. The
Grand Remonstrance of November, 1641,^
when the Long Parliament (which had semon-
extorted from the King authority to sit as
long as it should think proper) was just a year old,
was a sharp arraignment of the King for his arbitrary
policy. It was received with small favor, being car-
ried in Parliament by a bare majority against an op-
position so violent that a bloody battle seemed on the
point of taking place within the walls of St. Stephen's
itself. A reaction had set in wloich a cunning despot
might have used to make his position secure. Fortu-
nately Charles was as stupid as he was stubborn. By
violating the most cherished privileges of Parliament
in his attempt in January, 1642, to seize within the
House of Commons the Five Members, he
confirmed in the minds of the people the arrest the Five

1 1111 1 1 Members.

worst charges that had been brought as to
his disposition and purpose, and checked to a large
extent the outflow of sympathy which his situation
was beginning to evoke. To a large extent, but not
entirely ; for multitudes, both of high and low degree,
who in the time of the demand of ship-money had
been glad of the resistance of Hampden, and who
more recently had rejoiced when the usher of the

1 See " Constitutional Documents of the Puritan Revolution, selected
and edited by S. E. Gardiner," Clarendon Press, 1889, p. 127.

134 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOISI.

black rod committed Strafford to the Tower, had
begun to tliink that the course of reform was quite
too fast and too far, that the King had been disci-
plined enough, and that a good result for the country
would be sooner reached by standing for the Sover-
eign than by standing for the Houses.

Only war was jDossible. On the side of the King

were arrayed most of the nobles and gentry and

the vast number of those in a humble sta-

Constitution , • n t

of the two tion who were especially dependent upon

parties. i. j i. j.

them. Here, also, stood the universities
and most of those possessing a refined culture. As
to religious faith. Catholics and Anglicans were
adherents of the royal cause. The strength of the
Houses, on the other hand, lay in the " plain people."
In this class must be comprehended, first, the traders
and artisans of the towns, especially of London ; and,
second, the small landed proprietors in the country,
the yeomanry. For more than a century, this sturdy
body of the people had been diminishing in numbers,
and its decline had been lamented by great men.
" My father," said Hugh Latimer, in the first half of
the sixteenth century, "was a yeoman, and had no
lands of his own ; only he had a farm at a rent of
three or four pounds by the year at the uttermost,
and thereon he tilled so much as kept half a dozen
men. He had a walk for a hundred sheep, and my
mother milked thirty kine ; he was able and did find
the King a harness, with himself and his horse, when
he came to the place that he should receive the King's
wages. I can remember that I buckled his harness
when he went to Blackheath field. He kept me to
school ; he married my sisters for five pounds apiece,

THE ENGLAND OF CHARLES I. 135

SO that lie brought them up in godliness and fear of
God. He kept hospitality for his neighbors, and
some alms he gave to the poor. And all this he did
of the same farm, where he that now hath it payeth
sixteen pounds rent or more by the year, and is not
able to do anything for his Prince, for himself, nor
for his childi'en, nor to give a cup of drink to the
poor."

Sir Thomas More, too, referring to the straits into
which the small farmers were brought by the ad-
vancement of rent in Tudor days, declares : " In this
way it comes to pass that these poor wretches, men,
women, husbands, orphans, widows, parents with little
children, householders greater in number than in
wealth, all of these emigrate from their native fields,
without knowing where to go."

To these complaints may be added those of Roger
Ascham and Lord Bacon, at a time a little later.
"And so from the stuff of the Latimers, from the
sturdy spirit that amid the flames of the Oxford
stake cried, ' Play the man. Master Ridley,' and the
mingled strength and sweetness that neither pros-
perity could taint, nor the executioner abash, were
evolved thieves and vagrants, the mass of crimi-
nality and pauperism that still blights the innermost
petals and preys, a gnawing worm, at the root of
England's rose." ^

The disappearance at a later time of the yeomanry,
the English patriot to-day mourns over as the great-
est calamity which has befallen his country. In the
seventeenth century, however, the yeomen were still
numerous, for fully one hundred and sixty thousand

1 Henry George : Progress and Poverty, pp. 210, 211.

136 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

small farmers could be counted. From these, with
a considerable infusion from the craftsmen of the
cities, their close brothers, proceeded in the course
of the next few years, under the guidance of a match-
less leader of men, the most extraordinary soldiers
whom the world has ever seen, — of courage most
unflinching, of aim the highest, strictly submissive
to the severest discipline, and yet putting brain and
soul into their fighting to a degree not equalled
before or since.

In religion, the party of the Parliament comprised
all such as had lived in more or less definite non-
conformity to the English Church except the Catho-
lics ; in a word, the Puritans. No sharp line, indeed,
can be drawn between the partisans of King and
Parliament. There were traders and farmers who
fought for Charles, side by side with the nobles and
gentry and their retainers : the King's strength, how-
ever, did not lie with them. Just so for the Parlia-
ment, strove here and there high-born men of long
descent and great estates ; but from the outbreak of
war the number was small, and as the struggle pro»
ceeded it grew smaller, until the plain people at last
stood almost by themselves.

In the excited nation, the tumult of argument be-
tween neighbor and neighbor swelled into a roar of
OQtbreak of outcries of recrimination, out of which rose
^^^' at last, in 1642, the loud clash of arms.

As yet, there was no advance beyond the principles
of 1640, among the Parliamentarians. " King Pym "
ruled at Westminster with authority derived only
from an extraordinary personality ; but none the less
real on that account. Hampden, though not in chief

THE ENGLAND OF CHARLES I. 137

command in the army, yet at the head of the noble
Buckinghamshire regiment, the most popular man in
England, infused his spirit into those who had taken
the field. Both Pym and Hampden would have
shrunk utterly from popular government as we know
it ; for they saw nothing better for England than a
monarch, restricted, but still possessing power in
his own right, — nobles, under limitations, but still
possessing high privileges, — a people, not voiceless
in affairs of state, but by no means sovereign, by no
means the factor in the state through and for which
all things should be and be done. From Battieof
the brow of Edgehill, Charles, one clear Edgewii.
October day, sweeping with his eye the broad land-
scape, which extended from the hills of the western
shires, for the most part faithful to him, to the long
levels of the eastern counties, where lay the rebel
strength, beheld in the direction of Warwick the
advancing army of his foes. Presently on the plain
below. Prince Rupert for the first time in pitched
battle, with picturesque, mad energy, shook the reins
over the neck of his war-horse ; the Roundhead foot
standing meantime with the steadfastness that was to
bring to pass in the end memorable results. There
was no decision at Edgehill though there was much
bloodshed, but in the months that followed the scale
inclined in favor of the King. The year 1643, a
gloomy one for the Houses, drew forward with defeat
and loss. Pym died worn out at his post at St.
Stephen's ; Hampden fell at Chalgrove Field.

But a change for the better took place. While
Gloucester, beset by the conquering Cavaliers, resisted
with a courage that seemed only desperate and futile.

138 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

young Sir Hemy Vane, upon whom had fallen the
mantle of Pym, saved the all but hopeless cause of
the Houses by negotiating with the Scots the Solemn

League and Covenant,^ bringing thereby
Lea^e and to Ms disheartened party the friendship of
Maraton ™ an encrgctic nation, — a friendship at once

made tangible through a reinforcement of
twenty thousand hardy troops. The pikes of the
London train-bands found the joints of the Cavalier
armor on the field of Newbury. A few months more
and the hard rider, Rupert, was himself overridden
upon Marston Moor. Standing amid the wreck on
that terrible field, thinking of the panoply of proof
which the swords of his troopers had not been able to
shiver, and of the stout hearts which the panoply
covered, he administered a noteworthy baptism, so
that in Rupert's phrase those invincible squadrons
and their leader stand in history as Ironsides.

Marston Moor was for Charles the beginning of the
end. The Self-Denying Ordinance^ shelved for the
Parliament the incapable generals ; the New Model re-
organized and concentrated the army. On the Broad
Battle of Moor by Naseby, the King, outnumbered,
Naseby. dashed with all the valor in the world

upon the line of his foes. Rupert sought to wash out
the disgrace of his defeat before York in the blood of
the Parliamentary left ; but as he galloped too fast
and too far, Cromwell with the Ironsides trampled
out Sir Marmaduke Langdale, and Fairfax snatched
the colors from their dying bearer at the King's centre.
When, under the hot noon of that June day, the

1 Gardiner : Documents of the Puritan Revolution, pw 187.

2 Ibid., p. 205.

THE ENGLAND OF CHARLES L 139

roads northward to Leicester became the theatre of
panic-struck flight and implacable pursuit, all was
over for the cause of Charles: henceforth he could
only " flit like a wounded partridge," from castle to
castle, among his friends still faithful, till at last, at
Newark, he gave himself into the hands of his ene-
mies. Though beaten in the field, and in the power
of his foes, he was not yet hopeless. Among the
victors discord had arisen. The Independents ^ had
gradually acquired great influence, who, rejecting the
authority of both bishop and synod, demanded tolera-
tion for all shades of religious belief, — a principle
which filled the Presbyterians, heretofore mainly pow-
erful in Parliament, with no less horror than the
Popery and Prelacy which they had been so sternly
confronting. Charles imagined he might procure by
intrigue what he could not win by arms. He pal-
tered in a double sense, now with one party, now
with the other, reserving in his treacherous heart
the right to withdraw any promise he might make,
to falsify any word he might utter, to betray any
agent he might see fit to use, if he might thereby
further his scheme, to rule without restraint. For a
time he appeared likely to succeed. His foes were a
household utterly at variance among themselves. To
the eye of the world, the great army leaders, Crom-
well, Fairfax, Ireton, seemed to have lost all decision,
if not to have become quite faithless to the cause
for which they had fought. In the whole history of
human liberty there has been no more perilous crisis

1 For the effect of an influence from America upon the rise of the
Independents, se§ the T^riter's " Jjife of Young Sir Henry Vane," p.
164, etc.

140 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

than that which had now come about. Through
whom was the danger averted, and what means were
used in the work of saving ? In the story of Anglo-
Saxon freedom, no moment is more interesting than
that which we have reached ; there are no heroes whom
the lovers of that freedom should hold higher, than
those who now came forward. They were none other
than the common soldiers, the rank and

The rank and ^-i n -, -,. t • i i

file of the file of thosc extraordinary ironsides, who,

IronBidea. ^ _

as we know, were nothing more nor less
than the " plain people " in arms. They were trades-
men and artisans of the towns, who, in the stress of
the trying time, had laid aside yard-stick, hammer,
and plane; above all, they were the strong yeomen,
the stock that had furnished archers and spearmen to
the great Edwards and Henrys, the stock from which
came the faithful ceorls who died with Saxon Harold
in defence of the raven standard at Hastings. Out
from them had just gone the settlers of New Eng-
land. It was these yeomen, who, like their ancestors,
forsaking m a trying time plough and scythe for
blade and corselet (with what effect has been nar-
rated), now while the great men hesitated, inter-
fered that the fruits of their victories might be
secured. Forsaking the original ground of their
party, that King, Lords, and Commons should be in
equipoise, the rank and file of the Ironsides now put
forth a plea for that earlier polity, the polity of their
ancestors on the Weser plains, which, transferred to
Britain, had been fought for beneath the hill where
gleams even to-day the white horse, — the polity
renovated by Alfred, overwhelmed by the Normans, —
government of the people, by the people, and for the
people.

THE ENGLAND OF CHAKLES I. 141

In October, 1647, the army, fearing that their
effort for a freer England was to be in vain, had
mutinied. The mutiny had been promptly ^j^^.^. ^^^^
subdued, but the spirit out of which it f^^'"'^-
grew was destined to prevail for a time. The
mutineers had worn in their hats a paper which
had been drawn up and printed among the Agitators,
the lower council of the Army.^ It was called the
Agreement of the People ; at this, and at another
manifesto of the Army, The Case of the Whole
Army, it is now time for us to cast a glance. It
was not unnatural, perhaps, that seeing their generals
on intimate terms with the King, who lived in splen-
dor while the world did homage to him, the soldiers
should suspect them of lukewarmness, or indeed
treachery, as regarded things the soldiers felt to be
essential. This they express, and at the same time
they declare to their general as follows : —

" We presume that your Excellency will not think
it strange, or judge us disobedient or refractory, that
we should state the case of the Army, how declined
from its first principles of safety, what mischiefs are
threatened thereby, and what remedies are suitable.
For, sir, should you, yea, should the whole Parlia-
ment or Kingdom exempt us from this service, or
should command our silence and forbearance, yet
could not they nor you discharge us of our duty
to God, or to our own natures. ... If our duty
bind us when we see our neighbors' houses on fire,

1 The citations which follow have been previously used in the writer's
" Life of Young Sir Henry Vane " (p. 277, etc.), where the reader will
find the action of the Army and the Rump Parliament more fully
detailed,

142 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

to waive all forms, ceremonies, or compliments forth-
with (not waiting for order or leave) to attempt
the quenching thereof, without farther scruple as
thereunto called of God, . . . then much more are
we obliged and called, when we behold the great
mansion-house of the Commonwealth, and of this
Army, on fire, all ready to be devoured with slavery,
confusion, and ruin, and their national native free-
dom (the price of our treasure and blood) wrested
out of their hands, as at this present appeareth to
our best understanding," etc.^ This letter was dated
at Hempstead, October 15, 1647, and signed by the
Agitators, for the regiments of horse of Cromwell,
Ireton, Fleetwood, Rich, and Whalley, the core of
the Ironsides. Though prolix, it contains no cant
or superstition. Is there not, indeed, much beauty
and pathos here ? And now let us see what is rec-
ommended in a paper of proposals received in Par-
liament, November 1, from the Army.

" Having by our late labors and hazards made it ap-
pear to the world at how high a rate we value our just
freedom ; and God having so far owned our cause as
to deliver the enemies thereof into our hands, we do
now hold ourselves bound in mutual duty to each
other, to take the best care we can for the future, to
avoid both the danger of returning into a slavish
condition, and the changeable remedy of another
war. . . . That hereafter our Representatives [Par-
liaments] be neither left to an uncertainty for the
time, nor made useless to the ends for which they
were intended, we declare, I. That the people of

1 From the letter to Fairfax accompanying " The Case of the Whole
Army." Kushworth : Historical Collections, VII, p. 846, etc.

THE ENGLAND OF CHARLES L 143

England being at this day very unequally distributed
by counties, cities, and boroughs, for elections of
their deputies in Parliament, ought to be more indif-
ferently [impartially] proportioned, according to the
number of inhabitants." The clause goes on to
demand the arrangement of this before the end of the
present Parliament, which, in the 2d article, the
soldiers request may take place in September, 1648,
to prevent the inconvenience arising from the long
continuance of the same persons in authority. After
providing in the 3d article that Parliament shall be
chosen biennially, every second March, we find in
article 4, a most significant declaration: "That the
power of this and all future Representatives [Parlia-
ments] of this nation is inferior only to theirs who
chuse them, and extends, without the consent of any
other person or persons, to the enacting, altering, and
repealing of laws, to appointments of all kinds, to mak-
ing war and peace, to treating with foreign states,"
etc. ; with the following limitations, however : " I.
That matter of religion, and the ways of God's wor-
ship, are not at all intrusted by us to any human
power, because therein we cannot admit or exceed a
tittle of what our consciences dictate to be the mind
of God, without wilful sin: nevertheless, the public
way of instructing the nation, so it be not compul-
sive, is referred to their discretion." Other limita-
tions are, that there shall be no impressing of men
for service ; that after the present Parliament no one
is to be questioned for anything said or done in the
late disturbances ; that laws are to affect all alike, and
to be equal and good. " These things we declare to
be our native rights," the document concludes, and

144 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

we are compelled to maintain them, " not only by the
example of our ancestors, whose blood was often
spent in vain for the recovery of their freedoms,
suffering themselves through fraudulent accommoda-
tions to be still deluded of the fruit of their victory,
but also by our own woeful experience, who, having
long expected and dearly earned the establishment of
those certain rules of government, are yet made to
depend for the settlement of our peace and freedom,
upon him that intended our bondage and brought
a cruel war upon us."

This manifesto was signed by nine regiments of
horse and seven of foot. Had Roger Williams and
Samuel Adams put their heads together, could the
outcome have been better ? " The power of this and
all future Parliaments of this nation is inferior only
to theirs who chuse them, and extends, without the
consent of any other person or persons, to the enact-
ing, altering, and repealing df laws, to appointments
of all kinds, to making war and peace, to treating
with foreign states," no exception to be made but in
the matter of religion, — that to be intrusted to no
human power, but each man to choose as his con-
science may dictate.

Who the man was who formulated so finely these
utterances, no one can say. They came from the
rank and file : under some one of those steel head-
pieces worked the brain that outlined this noble
polity, in which there was no place for King, Lord,
or Prelate, because the People was to be Sovereign.
The leaders felt uneasy. Cromwell could not yet go
so far ; Ireton now rejected it with indignation.^

1 Godwin : History of the Commonwealth, II, p. 451.

THE ENGLAND OF CHARLES L 145

At a meeting convened in November to establish
harmony between chiefs and soldiers, when

•^ , . -, . T Reluctance of

the latter reiected a statement in which the leaders to

•* ^ ^ subscribe.

the name and essential prerogatives of a
King were provided for, Ireton abruptly departed,
declaring that such a matter must not be touched
upon. Vane, too, no doubt at this time was ap-
palled at such extreme ideas. Both Court, Presby-
tery, and Prelacy were hateful, but Royalty and an
Upper House seemed too potent and deeply rooted
to be disturbed. How untried and chimerical the
scheme of a republic, in which all precedents were
to be disregarded and tradition to be sacrificed !
From whom, too, did the ideas emanate ? from men
of no social importance, from Levellers, fanatical,
haughtily insubordinate, discountenanced by every
class in society hitherto held to be respectable !

But at such times men think quickly. The lead-
ers took the ideas of the rank and file, and before
the year ended the chiefs and the soldiers

The prayer-
were one. December 22, the shortest day meeting of the

'' Ironsides.

of the dark English winter, a public recon-
ciliation took place amid fasting and prayer. To-
gether they sought the Lord from nine in the morn-
ing until seven at night, Cromwell and Ireton among
others praying fervently and pathetically. The
assembly came forth hand in hand, and the condition
of union was that Charles Stuart, that man of blood,
should be called to account.^

1 Guizot : History of English Revolution, p. 388, American ed. ; also
life of Young Sir Henry Vane, pp. 281, 282.

146 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER X.

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH.

Commonwealtb, 1649. Oliver Cromwell, Protector, 1653.

Richard Cromwell, Protector, 1658.

DuEiNa the year 1648, a struggle took place in
England in which the Ironsides won a victory against
Civil war of tremcndous odds. The King, in the hands
1648. q£ ]jjg captors, seeking to draw advantage

from the distractions which prevailed among them, at
last leagued himself secretly with the Presbyterians of
Scotland, promising them indulgence for their form of
worship and an extirpation of the party of tolerance,
if by their help he could come again to the enjoyment
of his own. The warfare which followed was more
desperate than that of the earlier civil war. The
King was not in the field, and the disposition to spare
was far less. To the Scotch, the English Presby-
terians joined themselves in multitudes, men who till
now had fought stubbornly for the Houses ; while the
old Cavaliers, whether Catholic or Anglican, rode
forth again in actual combat, or with sword on thigh
only waited for a favorable moment. But the In-
dependents, now thoroughly united, were without
fear, and matchless both in the field and in counsel.
While Vane headed off plots at Westminster, Ireton
and Fairfax, and above all Cromwell, smote with a
warlike efiiciency scarcely ever-paralleled. Royalism

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH. 147

in Wales was trampled under foot. In Southern
England, the King's cause, fiercely fought for about
London, went down utterly at last in the fall of the
stronghold of Colchester, in Essex ; while coiohester
Cromwell, in midsummer, with an army ^""^ Preston,
small but perfect, sweeping in long detour from
Western Wales to Central England, then far north
into Lancashire, untouched by heat or fatigue, fell
upon the flank of the invading Scots, and, eight
thousand against twenty thousand, swept them from
the earth at the battle of Preston. At the end
of the summer all resistance had ceased; the Iron-
sides were masters of England, and their hands were
hard. Presently the programme of the victors was
announced. The captains now stood thoroughly
with their men and with the chiefs at St. Stephen's.

The Grand Army Remonstrance,^ written by Ire-
ton, is the long and carefully prepared wprk of a
scholar and lawyer. Though addressed
to the House of Commons, it was intended Army Remon-
to express to the nation the position of
the Army, and the plan they meant to pursue. The
attempt to treat with the King was solemnly
denounced; "though the Lord had again laid bare
his arm, and that small Army which they had
ceased to trust, and had well-nigh deserted and cast
off, had been enabled to shiver all the banded
strength of a second English insurrection, aided by
Scotland, — even after the rebuke from God, were
they not pursuing the same phantom of accommoda-
tion ? " The principle was laid down that the " Repre-
sentative Council of Parliament " must be supreme ;

1 Rushworth, VII, pp. 1297-98, 1311-12, 1330. Whltlocke, II, p. 436.

148 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

that any form of monarchy must be regarded as a
creation of that freely elected council for special
ends and within special limits ; and that the monarch,
if in any way derelict, could justly be called to
account. It was urged that Charles deserved to be
so called to account. If there were any hope of
amendment, he might be treated tenderly. " If there
were any good evidence of a proportionable remorse
in him, and that his coming in again were with a new
or changed heart, ... his person might be capable
of pity, mercy, and pardon, and an accommodation
with him, with a full and free yielding on his part to
all the aforesaid points of public and religious inter-
est in contest, might, in charitable construction, be
just, and possibly safe and beneficial." But the King
had been utterly faithless, it was urged, and contin-
ued to be so. In a passage showing how thoroughly
they penetrated the .King's falseness, it was declared
that even now, after his complete second ruin, he
was plotting and prevaricating, while secretly ex-
pecting aid from the Irish rebels. "Have you not
found him at this play all along, and do not all men
acknowledge him most exquisite at it ? " At length
came the immediate demands, and, first, that the
King might be brought to justice ; that his heirs, the
boys afterAvard to be Charles II and James II, should
return to England and submit themselves completely
to the judgment of the nation ; and that a number of
the chief instruments of the King in the wars should be
brought with him to capital punishment. All obdu-
rate delinquents were to undergo banishment and con-
fiscation of property, and all claims of the Army to be
fully satisfied. In the prospective demands, with which

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH. 149

the noble document ends, the Army require : 1, a ter-
mination of the existing Parliament within a reason-
able time ; 2, a guaranteed succession of subsequent
Parliaments, annual or biennial, the franchise to be
so adjusted that Parliament shall reaUy represent all
reputable Englishmen ; 3, the temporary disfranchise-
ment of all who had adhered to the King ; and, 4,
a strict provision that the representation of the people
should be supreme in all things, only not to re-ques-
tion the policy of the Civil War itself, or touch the
foundations of common right, liberty, and safety. In
the polity indicated, the kingship, if kept up, was to
be a purely elective office, every successive holder of
which should be chosen expressly by Parliament, and
should have no veto on laws passed by Parliament, —
in other words, an American President, — elected by
Congress, however, instead of an Electoral College,
and shorn of his great power of the negative voice.

These were the ideas of the soldiers, but not of the
majority of Parliament. While the Army-men had
been setting forth their Grand Remon-

. n T-» T IT Parliament

strance, a committee from Parhament had resists the

• • • T 1 Army.

been negotiatmg a new treaty with the
King. The latter, untaught by his more recent re-
verses, as also he had been untaught by those of the
earlier war, would make no concessions upon which
any reliance could be placed. Nevertheless, the ma-
jority of Parliament voted for concluding peace with
him, taking action which would have restored Charles
at once to the throne, possessed of a power which
would have enabled him to put an end straightway
to those who had upheld freedom, and to all they
had fought for. To secure their own lives, to secure

150 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

what was more precious to them than life, the popu-
lar freedom for which they had been so long fighting,
Pride's Par e ^^^J revolutionary means were now ade-
quate : Colonel Pride took his place at the
door of St. Stephen's and turned out one hundred
and forty-three members, cutting down the Long
Parliament into the famous Rump, in which none
were allowed to sit but those who accepted the prin-
ciples of the Army.

As to Pride's Purge, it is hard to see, at the present
time, what other course it was possible for the Army
to take in order to save their cause. Nothing can be
ireton's decia- ^^^^5 ^^ ^^7 ^^^^ than the manifestoes of
rations. Army and Rump at this crisis, for the

composition of which Ireton must be especially
credited. " We are not," it was declared, " a mer-
cenary Army, hired to serve any arbitrary power of
the state, but called forth and conjured by the several
declarations of Parliament to the defence of our own
and the People's just rights and liberties ; and so we
took up in justice and conscience, to those ends, and
are resolved ... to assert and vindicate them against
all arbitrary power, violence, and oppression, and all
particular interests and parties whatsoever."

What were the ideas with which this wonderful
Rump, still the Long Parliament, though purged,
began its career? The 4th of January may be set
down as the beginning of the new order of things.
That day,^ it was resolved by the little company now
left in the great emptiness of St. Stephen's — for not
only were the excluded members absent, but many
timid ones, — " That the Commons of England in Par-

1 Commons Journal (under date).

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH. 151

liament assembled do declare, that the People are,
under God, the original of all just power ; and do also
declare, that the Commons of England in Parliament
assembled, being chosen by and representing the
People, have the supreme power in this nation ; and
do also declare, that whatsoever is enacted or declared
for law, by the Commons in Parliament assembled,
hath the force of a law, and all the People of this
nation are concluded thereby, although the consent
and concurrence of the King or House of Peers be
not had thereto."

A declaration was received from the Army on
January 15th, the day the charge was read against
the King. The Army urged : " That having since the
end of the last war waited for a settlement of the
peace and government of this nation : and having not
found any such essayed or endeavored by those whose
proper work it was, but their many addresses and
others in that behalf, rejected and opposed, and only
a corrupt closure endeavored with the King on terms
serving only to his interests and theirs that promoted
it, and being thereupon . . . necessitated to take ex-
traordinary ways of remedy, — they have at last fin-
ished the draught of such a settlement in the nature
of an Agreement of the People for peace
among themselves, it containing the best mentofthe
and most hopeful foundations for the peace
and future well government of this nation, that they
can possibly devise. And they appeal to the con-
sciences of all that read it, to witness whether they
have therein provided or propounded anything of ad-
vantage to themselves . . . above others, or aught but
what is as good for one as for another; not doubt-

152 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ing but that those worthy patriots of Parliament will
give their seal of approbation thereunto, and all good
people with them. But if God shall suffer the
People . .. to be so blinded ... as to make opposition
thereto, . . . they hope they shall be acquitted before
God and good men from the blame of any further
troubles, distractions, and miseries to the kingdom,
which may arise through the neglect and rejection
thereof."

On the 20th, the Agreement of the People ^ was
formally presented. It has the name and many of
the ideas of the manifesto of the Agitators, in the
fall of 1647. It has become now a detailed and
definite scheme of government on which we can
well afford to dwell.

In 1647, Ireton, to whom the bold and masterly
elaboration was for the most part due, had not been
ready for so radical a step, and had left the council
abruptly, as we have seen, at the suggestion of laying
by the King; but in the Army now, rank and file
and chiefs stood together. The paper consisted of
ten articles. The 1st demands the dissolution of the
present Parliament by the end of April, 1649. The
2d assuming that the supreme power in England is
thenceforth to be a single representative House, de-
clares that every such future " Representative " shall
consist of four hundred members, or not more, and
distributes these, with great care, among the shires,
cities, and boroughs of England and Wales. York-
shire is to send twenty members ; Devonshire, seven-
teen ; Middlesex, fourteen ; Cornwall, enormously
over-represented hitherto, eight; and so until we

1 Gardiner : Documents oi the Puritan Revolution, p. 270.

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH. 153

reach the small counties of Rutland and Flint, which
have but one each. It is worth while to specify-
to some extent in order to see how remarkably
the reforms of 1832 were anticipated. The 3d gives
the time of meeting and defines the qualifications
of the electors and the eligible. All men of full
age and householders, except paupers, and (for the
first seven years) armed adherents of the King in
the late wars, are to be the electors. The eligible
are to be those qualified as electors, with restrictions
designed to keep out for the first few Parliaments
the King's partisans. The 4th considers the matter
of a quorum. The 5th is very important, requiring
every Parliament, within twenty days of its first
meeting, to appoint a Council of State, to be the
acting ministry or government in co-operation with
itself, and also in the interval, between it and the
next Parliament. Passing over the 6th, 7th, 8th,
as relatively unimportant, in the 9th we find the
relation in which the government is to stand to the
Church. Christianity, it is hoped, will be the per-
manent national religion: Parliament may establish
any form of church not popish or prelatic ; dis-
senters are, however, to be tolerated and protected,
the liberty, nevertheless, not "necessarily to extend
to Popery or Prelacy." The 10th defines treason and
indicates what in the preceding articles shall be held
as essential.

Except the 8th article, relating to the religious
establishment, which, judged by modern ideas, is
narrow, there is nothing here not most thoroughly
reasonable. Ireton himself, like Cromwell and Vane,
■was ready for the broadest toleration, including even

154 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Jews, infidels, and Pagans ; but even in the Rump,
there were prejudices that must be humored. On the
6th of February it was resolved : ^ " That the House
of Peers in Parliament is useless and dangerous,
and ought to be abolished," and on the following
day, " that the office of King ... is unnecessary,
burdensome, and dangerous to the liberty, safety,
and public interest of the People of tliis nation, and
therefore ought to be abolished." The old order was
thus completely swept away, and England was a
itsanticipa- Republic. The English reforms already
ern reforms, gained in the nineteenth century, and still
in progress at the present hour, were all
anticipated: all, too, that is most essential in the
American system had been formulated. The great
change was marked by the execution of the King,
which took place January 30, 1649."

Thus we see that popular government, the heritage
from the ancient Saxon time, seemed likely to have
in the days of the Ironsides a most complete and
memorable revival. It is to be noticed that it came
about as something into which people were forced,
rather than something which they voluntarily em-
braced. Eliot, Pym, and Hampden never conceived
for England of a polity in which King and Lords
should be swept away. It was the rank and file of
the Army, the plain people, the tradesmen of the
towns ; or rather, since the towns in great majority
became Presbyterian, it was the small farmers, the
yeomen, from whom proceeded the first assertion

1 Commons Journal (under date).

2 The preceding summary is taken from the author's life of Vane,
Chapter XIV, which see for fuller details.

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH. 155

of a complete right to self-government. Their own
leaders at first held back, in some cases denouncing
so thorough a sweep. At last, however, Cromwell,
Ireton, Vane, and Milton stood thoroughly with the
men, — justifying themselves in their course by the
belief that they undertook no new thing, but only
restored the essentials of that most ancient freedom
that had been so deeply overlaid.^ These were the
principles of the Independents, — the Ironsides,
namely, and the Rump, the mutilated Parliament
which represented them at St. Stephen's. Did the
principles take effect at once?

By no means. All Europe was against the Inde-
pendents. Of the whole English nation, they could
count for sympathy only upon about two-sevenths.
The remaining five-sevenths were their bitter enemies.
The old Cavaliers preferred to freedom the despotism
of a King; the Anglicans among them longed for
Prelacy of the Laud type ; the Catholics, for a
hierarchy of the Romish model, — for a restoration of
the monasteries, a displacing of all Protestant worship
by the mass, and an acknowledgment of the suprem-
acy of the Pope. The Presbyterians abhorred the
toleration which was a cardinal principle of the vic-
tors, and hungered for the spiritual despotism of the
synod. The Army and the Rump, however, hoped
to win the nation to their view, and resolutely went
to work to maintain their position by the sword
against the world in arms on every side. It was an
absurd ground, in a certain way, which they occu-
pied : believers in the fullest freedom, they sought to
force freedom upon men who would rather be in

1 See the writer's "Life o;E Vane," for evidence of thi§.

156 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

fetters. They were in their own hearts greatly-
troubled by the situation. Still their trouble of mind
brought no paralysis, and they entered upon a career
than which history has nothing more marvellous.
Postponing until a more convenient time the reor-
ganization of England, according to the Agree-
ment of the People, they resolved for the present
Temporary *° ^^*™ *^^ Rump, Organizing for an
§rthe°Eump executive a Council of State ^ of forty-
di'^oma^e.'"'" nine, to be appointed annually by Parlia-
ment from the " Honest Party." All
recognized this government as nothing but an oli-
garchy, a temporary expedient to which the heavy
pressure of a difficult hour drove them. They had
sketched, however, the general scheme of a far dif-
ferent constitution, and strove, even while they were
fighting, to elaborate all the details so that it might
be bestowed at the earliest possible moment upon the
nation, if they could ever succeed in winning the
nation to adopt their views.

The active enemies of the Commonwealth gave
them not one moment's respite. Whether the execu-
tion of Charles was an unavoidable neces-
mentsofthe sity, as CromwcU believed, or a melan-

Independente. -,■,■, ^ ^ i* t tt -r* ,,

choly blunder or the " Honest Party, as
Vane thought, it is even now impossible to decide.
At any rate, it had this effect. The Cavaliers, every-
where horrified, were immensely stimulated in their
desire to crush the men that had so far foiled them ;
and thousands who had before been lukewarm, or
indeed, had fought zealously in previous years for the
cause of the Houses, now ranged themselves among

I Gardiner : Documents o( the Puritan Eevolution, p. 291.

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH. 157

the Royalists. Luckily for the Commonwealth, its
enemies were at ill accord among themselves. Cath-
olic, Anglican, and Presbyterian could not cordially
join. The odds, however, against the Commonwealth
were tremendous, to be coped with only by the most
consummate generalship and statecraft, combined
with the most dauntless courage.

At once, Cromwell with twelve thousand men was
thrown upon Ireland, where the Duke of Ormond,
uniting all factions, presented a front full cromweiim
of danger. The sword has never done irei'""^-
work more sharp and swift. The strait for the Com-
monwealth was desperate, and desperate and bloody
was the wrestle as it threw itself upon its foe. Vic-
tory was complete, and Cromwell was soon at home
for other work, and none too soon. The young King,
Charles II, had meantime landed in Scotland; had
taken the covenant, in that way winning the enthusi-
astic support of the North, which before had, to a
man, been horror-stricken by the execution of Charles
I; and now, at the head of the whole power of
Scotland, was preparing to win his father's throne.
Prompt as the powers of fate, the Ironsides faced him.
They did not await the coming of the enemy, but
rushed north to strike them in their own territory, if
possible, unprepared. Never, during his whole career,
did Cromwell confront a host so dangerous as

° Dunbar.

during August, 1650. It outnumbered his own
more than two to one ; the hearts of the Scots,'among
the bravest of men, were thoroughly in their cause ;
their leader, David Leslie, was the boldest and at the
same time the wariest soldier whom the world in that
age could have sent against him. By skilful manoeu-

158 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

vxing the Scots brought Cromwell to the verge of
destruction. For a month, there was not a mistake,
not an opportunity which could be used. Cromwell
was penned into a little corner by the sea, his men
fast sickening about him, his hope all but extinct.
Just here the mistake was made. The opportunity
was instantly seized, and out of it came the almost
miraculous victory of Dunbar, where, with a loss of
not more than thirty Ironsides, three thousand Scots
were left for dead, ten thousand captured, and the
rest driven in complete rout. Any but Scots would
have been utterly overthrown. They, however, rallied
and recruited with the truest grit ; then while Crom-
well in an unguarded moment was pressing on their
flank, they rushed for England, raising the country
as they went, and not halting until they reached the
Midlands. At Worcester, however, all was
over for them, and so far as Great Britain
was concerned, not a hand could longer be raised
against the Commonwealth. But it remained to
teach Europe how formidable the new power had
War with bccome. The occau war with Holland fol-
Hoiiand. lowed, in which, with Vane as administrator
and Blake to marshal the fleets, England first won the
empire of the seas. Every foe was at last crushed.

Why, therefore, could not the Commonwealth be
now established according to the plan of the Agree-
ment of the People? In spite of the victories, the
people had not been won ; neither Rump nor Army
dared to give the nation to itself; master of itself,
there was sure to be on the part of the nation a sur-
render presently into the hands of the old tyranny.
Just here came another of the series of momentous

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH. 159

scliisms that mark the history of this disturbed time.
As the polyp, attaining a fair size, having encoun-
tered an obstacle, suddenly bisects itself, the divisions
proceeding afterward on their way, or drifting into
antagonism with one another, each a living organism
independent within itself, ready to undergo at any
moment new bisection, — so does the political party
proceed in its development. England at the opening
of the Long Parliament suddenly became Cavalier and
Roundhead; the Roundheads, triumphing, presently
became Presbyterian and Independent ; the Independ-
ents having gained the day, it was now their turn to
split. The cleavage came, and at the heads of the sev-
ered portions stood respectively Vane and

/^ n-fcT'i C11 1 BchiBm among

Cromwell. Neither telt that a settlement the independ-
ents.
could be left to a Parliament freely elected :

if any advantage was to remain from the triumphs so
painfully won over encroaching prerogative and priv-
ilege, the champions who had borne the brunt of the
fight must retain a guiding power. The plan which
Vane favored was to cause a new Parliament to be
elected ; but the Rump was to judge as to the suita-
bility of the members returned, and each member of
the Rump was to have a seat in the new assembly.
This function of the Rump was to be only a tempo-
rary makeshift, to be discarded at the earliest possi-
ble moment. To no one was such a limitation more
repugnant than to the freedom-loving Vane ; but
only in this way, in his judgment, in the stress of
that disturbed time, could it be made certain that
England would not go back to the Stuarts. Crom-
well felt, on the other hand, that the Rump must be
no longer tolerated: that, at any rate, must give

160 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

■way ; and if England could not yet be "trusted with
its own freedom, he would himself, with a council of
officers, " play the constable " and see that order was
preserved until the better time should arrive. So
Dissolution of Came April 20, 1653, when Cromwell,
theEump. having turned out the members of the
Rurap and locked behind them the door of St.
Stephen's, entered upon his constable's work which
was to last through five famous years.

"The day never came when Cromwell felt he could
cease to be a despots With almost miraculous ability
The autocracy ^® Sustained himself, — ability no more con-
of Cromwell, gpicuous in dealing with foreign and open
enemies, than against the constant plots of secret
foes. His old mother at Whitehall shivered when-
ever she heard the report of a gun, or an unusual
crash, through fear that some assassin had at length
found the heart of her son ; — and it was no foolish
fear! He tried repeatedly to surrender the nation
into the hands of its own representatives sitting in
Parliament: each time, however, there had been a
questioning of matters which he thought shoidd not
be touched, and so each time, at the autocratic word,
St. Stephen's had emptied itself, leaving all to the
Protector's sword. He put aside the title of King,
but a rule more absolute than that of any English
King prevailed. Dividing England into military dis-
tricts over each of which he set a major-general, a grim
Ironside, whose sword was absolute, he ruled with an
unconstitutional tyranny compared with which that
of the Stuarts was mere child's play, — no more arbi-
trary, however, than it was beneficent, as potent to
beckon into life all things great and good, as it was

THE ENGLISH COMMONWEALTH. 161

to dash into ruin all things that made for ill. Who
that follows that wonderful career, that reads those
letters ^ and speeches, stammering, incoherent, will
abate a word from Milton's great panegyric ?

" ' He was a soldier disciplined to perfection in a
knowledge of himself. Hq had either extinguished
or by habit had learned to subdue the Hilton's pane-
whole host of vain hopes, fears, and pas- ^s'™-
sions which invest the soul. He first acquired the
government of himself ... so that on the first day
he took the field against the external enemy, he was
a veteran in arms. . . . The whole surface of the
British empire has been the theatre of his triumphs.
The good and the brave were from all quarters at-
tracted to his camp, not only as to the best school of
military talents, but of piety and virtue. His soldiers
were a stay to the good, a terror to the evil, and the
warmest advocates for every exertion of piety and
virtue. While you, O Cromwell, are left among us,
he hardly shows a proper confidence in the Supreme,
who distrusts the security of England. We all will-
ingly yield the palm of sovereignty to your unrivalled
ability and virtue, except the few among us who do
not know that nothing in the world is more pleasing
to God than that the supreme power should be vested
in the best and the wisest of men. Such, Crom-
well, all acknowledge you to be ; such are the ser-
vices which you have rendered as the leader of our
councils, the general of our armies, and the father of
your country. Continue your course with the same
unrivalled magnanimity : it sits well upon you. To
you our country owes its liberties, nor can you sus-

1 See Oarlyle's Cromwell.

162 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

tain a character at once more momentous and more
august than that of the author, the guardian, and the
preserver of our liberties. Hence you have not only-
eclipsed the achievements of all our Kings, but even
those which have been fabled of our heroes.' " ^

When at last his mighty hand relaxed, nothing
was possible but the Restoration. The world was in
truth not yet ready .^

" Thus ended, apparently in simple catastrophe, the
enterprise of projecting into sudden reality the im-
Beneflte se- pulsc of Spiritual freedom. Its only result,
EngHBh^Eevo- 3'S it might Seem, had been to prevent the
transition of the feudal into an absolute
monarchy, and thus to prepare the way for the plu-
tocracy under feudal forms which has governed Eng-
land since the death of William III. This, however,
is but a superficial view. Two palpable benefits the
short triumph of Puritanism did win for England.
It saved it from the Catholic reaction, and it created
the dissenting bodies. The fifteen years of vigorous
growth which Cromwell's sword secured for the
church of the sectaries, gave it a permanent force
which no reaction could suppress, and which has
since been the great spring of political life in Eng-
land." 3

' 1 Def ensio Secunda pro Populo Anglicano (translation) . See Life of
Young Sir Henry Vane, pp. 414, 454, 455.

2 Gneist: Geschiehte und heutige Gestalt der Aemter in England,
p. 226, etc.

8 Thomas Hill Green : Lectures on the English Commonwealth.
Works, ni, pp. 363, 364.

THE REVOLUTION OP 1688. 163

CHAPTER XI.

THE KEVOLUTION OP 1688.

Charles II, 1660. William and Mary, 1689.

James II, 1685. Anne, 1702.

The Commonwealth went down after its brave
struggle to establish sovereignty of the people, and a
reaction began which went to great ex- T^^jj^gj^^^.
tremes. Charles II returned in the midst "°°-
of enthusiasm so excessive that the stern Republicans
who for some glorious years had had all things in
their hands, were completely silenced. The new
King, like his father and grandfather, was ready to
claim high prerogatives, but his subjects showed
a subserviency that surprised him. Foremost in
loyal zeal stood the clergy of the Anglican Church,
which came back over the temporary wreck of
Presbyterianism and Independency, into a power
greater than ever before. What were the Reaction from
claiiiis of James I and the Royalists at the {^| comm°in-
beginning of the century, we have already ^«»'"'-
noted.^ These doctrines of absolutism, during the
time of the Commonwealth so thoroughly repudiated,
came at the Restoration again to the surface in forms
more marked than ever. Every Anglican pulpit, —
and no other pulpits were now tolerated, — taught
with the strongest emphasis the divine right of kings.
Writers arose who undertook to show that Magna

1 pp. 104, 105.

164 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Cliarta itself and every constitutional law were rebel-
lious encroachments on the ancient, imprescriptible
prerogatives of the monarchy.^ The theories of a
certain Sir Robert Filmer were especially in vogue,
according to which the King stood above all law.
He taught that the Supreme Being regarded heredi-
tary monarchy with peculiar favor. No human
power, no length of adverse possession, could deprive
a legitimate prince of his right : his authority must of
necessity be despotic ; the laws by which his prerog-
atives were limited were merely concessions of the
King which he might at any time revoke : any treaty
which he might make with his subjects was simply a
declaration of his present intentions, and not at all a
contract the performance of which might be required.^
The theme which the clergy insisted on beyond every
other was "non-resistance," — that nothing whatever
in the way of crime or folly committed by a legiti-
mate prince, could justify subjects in rebelling. He
might be imbecile or as cruel as Nero, but his will
must be done. Charles was ready to claim much, but
the Church accorded to him even more than he would
have claimed. Extravagant, however, though the
Church was in its loyalty, the temper of the majority,
as reflected in Parliament, bore it fully out.

The student of history is disposed to think some-
times that the true benefactors of mankind have been
the knaves and fools, rather than men
ing from the good and wise. What brought to pass
of Charles n Maffua Charta was the villanv of John.

and James II. _, ° ^ . _, . i ■» , »

Ihe work ot Simon de Montfort was pre-

1 Hallam: Constitutional History, II, p. 439.

2 Maoaulay : History of England, I, p. 55.

THE REVOLUTION OF 1688. 165

pared by the abuses suffered through the weak
Henry III. Headstrong Richard II made a way
for the constitutional rule of the Lancastrians. So
now it must be said that at the end of the seven-
teenth century, Anglo-Saxon freedom was saved only
through the circumstance that the two Stuart kings
were utterly unworthy men, — Charles II, a selfish,
frivolous voluptuary; James II, a cruel and stupid
bigot. What if the occupant of the throne during
this mood of subserviency into which the people had
so largely sunk, had been a ruler really good and
gifted, — a Charlemagne, a Louis IX of France, a
Frederick II ; — or indeed some one of the heroes
of the English line, arbitrary but masterful, — a
William the Conqueror, the second or even the
eighth Henry, or Elizabeth? It must be believed
that in such a case the fire of freedom would have
become extinguished. It was the abuse of power
only, by Sovereigns vicious and incapable, that
brought the people to their senses.

As the reign of Charles proceeded, his private
character grew constantly worse; as he sank him-
self, his example drew his court more and

, 1P1 !• ^^^ nation

more deeply into the slough oi brutal vice, forced into
His public policy, also, plunged the nation
into ever-increasing disgrace. He sold himself to
Louis XIV, engaging the power of his kingdom to
aid the selfish schemes of France. He forsook his
best friends, the bishops and priests of the established
Church, offering for a bribe to become a Catholic,
and dying at last in the profession of that faith.
James II came to the throne an avowed Catholic.
Though his faith was abhorrent, the Anglican Church

166 ANGLO-SAXOK FREEDOM.

in a mass, many of the nobles, and the great majority
of the country gentry, were at first ready to be
consistent; they adhered to the doctrine of non-
resistance and let the new King do his will. But
every day it grew plainer that Jardes could not be
endured. His chosen instruments were Jeffreys of
the Bloody Assizes, Kirk and his "lambs," and in
Scotland, Grahame of Claverhouse, — torturers and
executioners, who beneath the King's very eyes
applied the thumb-screw and the boot, and multi-
plied everywhere the gibbet and scaffold, till mercy
and reason seemed about to flee from the world.
Abuses and cruelties stung the nation to resistance.

Though the work of the great Long Parliament
had appeared to be utterly discredited and over-
thrown, it began to be plain that certain important
things had been after all established. Subservient
though the people had seemed, and unprincipled
though the two royal brothers were, yet no effort
had been made to set up again the Star Chamber
and High Commission Courts. It was clear that
no such illegality as the ship-money extortion could
again be attempted. It was recognized that the
constitution must be that of 1642; all the acts of
the Long Parliament which had received the sanc-
tion of King Charles I before the outbreak of the
Civil "War, were admitted.^ A sufficient number
had become so sick of absolutism as to make possible
The Bill of ^^^* Statement of the fundamental prin-
Rights. ciples of the constitution contained in

the instrument known as the Declaration of Rights.
It was prepared by a committee of which the illus-

1 Macaulay : History of England, I, p. 119.

THE KEVOLUTION OF 1688. 167

trious Somers was chairman. It began by recapit-
ulating the crimes and errors which had made a
revolution necessary. James had invaded the prov-
ince of the legislature, had treated modest petition-
ing as a crime, had oppressed the Church by means
of an illegal tribunal, had, without consent of the
Parliament, levied taxes and maintained a standing
army in time of peace, had violated the freedom of
election, and perverted the course of justice. The
Lords and Commons once more in Parliament asserted
the ancient rights and liberties of England ; the dis-
pensing power had no legal existence ; no money was
to be exacted without grant of Parliament ; the right
of subjects to petition, of electors to choose repre-
sentatives, of Parliament to free debate, of the nation
to a pure and merciful administration of justice, —
all these were solemnly affirmed. The Declaration
of Rights, made law by Parliament, became the Bill
of Rights.^ James was deposed, and Mary,
his daughter, with her able husband, wiiiiamand

° Mary.

William, Prince of Orange, became King
and Queen of England. Both were Stuarts; for
William, as well as his wife, was a grandchild of
Charles 1. Both, however, were sturdily Protestant,
decent in their lives, and personages of sense and
strength. With William and Mary began for Eng-
land a better time.

To appreciate the momentous character of the Rev-
olution of 1688, a glance must be cast at the condition
of other civilized countries at that day.

. , Extinction of

France, Spain, and Italy, though nations liberty on the

' J^ "^ ° continent.

of Latin stock, had received in the early
1 See Appendix C for the full text,

168 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

centuries of the Christian era a strong Teutonic infu-
sion, and at one time had possessed, as we have seen,
institutions characterized to some extent by the same
Teutonic freedom which had gone with the Anglo-
Saxons to the island of Britain.^ In Germany and
Scandinavia the stock was more purely Teutonic,
and in those lands the polity of the forefathers had
long endured. Russia, though Slavic, was at any
rate Aryan, and her people possessed in the mir a
village community as marked in its independence as
the tuns and burhs of the Anglo-Saxons. In all
these countries, however, the traces of popular free-
dom had long been effaced. The old national assem-
blies in France, Spain, and Italy had nearly or
quite disappeared. The perishing of liberty under
the blight of despots had been in Germany and the
northern lands even more complete ; in Russia, the
local self-government had proved utterly sterile as
regards resources for coping with the greed of tyrants.
Only in Switzerland there smouldered in valleys
almost inaccessible the embers of freedom, by the
great world unnoticed and indeed unknown. Hol-
land, to be sure, had wrenched itself from the grasp
of Spain, but had fallen apparently into the hands of
an oligarchy. Throughout Europe the right of the
great t"o make laws and levy taxes was undisputed ;
thrones were guarded by regular armies ; the prompt
penalties for any criticism of the rulers were the dun-
geon and the scaffold. Again and again the same
calamity had been imminent over England. But for
Langton and the Barons, in 1215, what might not
John have done ? Had factious nobles pressed less

I p. 62.

THE REVOLUTION OF 1688. 169

heavily upon the Lancastrians, could the noble con-
stitutional progranune described by Fortescue ever
have become real? Had the Tudors dared a little
more, or had the one man Strafford not been taken
from the right hand of Charles I, where could free-
dom have harbored ? These crises, as we have seen,
had all been safely passed. With the promulgation
of the Bill of Rights, the crisis of 1688 was also
safely passed.

The deposition of James II stands in history under
the name of a revolution : it, however, was a strictly
defensive movement, having on its side Revolution
prescription and legitimacy.-'^ The mon- °^'^^^^-
archy as limited in the thirteenth century had come
down to the seventeenth century. Parliament had
behind it a past of four hundred years. The consti-
tution was not formulated, but its principles, scat-
tered throughout time-honored statutes, were en-
graven on the hearts of Englishmen. No one of its
principles was based upon precedents more ancient
or more frequent, than that Kings reigned by a right
in no respect differing from that by which knights-of-
the-shire exercised authority in behalf of their con-
stituents.^ The Bill of Rights simply affirmed this
principle. Not a single new right was given to the
people ; the whole body of English law was un-
changed ; all was conducted in obedience to the
ancient formalities. The Revolution of 1688 decided
that the popular element in the English polity, of
such ancient derivation, so often brought very low
and yet never extinguished, should once more sur-
vive. In 1688, the old land in this struggle against

1 Macaulay : History of England, I, p. 514, etc. ^ mci,^ p. 216.

ITO ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

autocracy which we have seen so often renewed, for
the last time stood alone. When next the conflict
was joined, forces were to appear from a new hemi-
sphere. The time was now not far off when popular
liberty was to start up into a life no longer environed
by perils, but clearly revealed as destined for the
dominion of the world.

For many years after 1688, it seemed most doubt-
ful whether the principles of the Revolution could be
Whigs and maintained. Two great parties, the Tories
Tones. ^^^ ^j^g Whigs, comiug into existence at the
close of the seventeenth century, have persisted
unchanged in name and in general characteristics
until the present day. The Tories accepted the doc-
trine of the divine right of Kings ; and when con-
sistent, were ready to obey a Herod or a Caligula,
if only he were in the legitimate line; and to
depose an Alfred, if he had come to power through
any irregularity in the succession. To the Tories
belonged, first of all in zeal, the Anglican clergy
with all whom they could influence, many of the
great nobles, and a great majority of the country
gentry. A great part of the Tories were at first
ready even to sustain such a sovereign as James,
though in the end a sufficient number were so far es-
tranged through his attacks on the Church and the
constitution, as to make possible his deposition. The
principle of the Whigs, on the other hand, was that
the King was the creature and servant of the nation,
which could justly set him aside if he were wicked or
neglectful; the supreme power rested with Parlia-
ment. The hopes of freedom, of course, were bound

THE REVOLUTION OF 1688. 171

up with the ,success of the Whigs, whose strength lay-
in a certain proportion of the higher aristocracy ; in
what was left of the yeomanry, unfortunately now
fast diminishing in number ; and in the commercial
classes, who had become immensely important. As
all over whom Anglicanism had power were almost
necessarily Tories, so all non-conformists were almost
necessarily Whigs. The commercial classes and the
non-conformists were, to a large extent, important
one and the same, — a statement which per- ^^^''^^'Hcod^^
haps may be said to have a general appli- co™merciai^
cation. " Trade is most vigorously carried °'^^'^^-
on in every state and government by the heterodox
part of the same, and such as profess opinions differ-
ent from what are publicly established." Lecky,
quoting this remark from the " Political Arithmetic "
of Sir William Petty ,i ascribes what he believes to be
a fact, partly to the accessibility of town populations
to new ideas, and partly to persecuting laws which, in
the Stuart days, divorced dissenters from the soil and
drove them to shop, work-bench, and ship. Among
the manufacturers and traders of England now also
were many of foreign stock. Thousands
of skilled artisans, expatriated as heretics nots an/ooier
from Catholic lands, had gone into exile.
Spain and France thus experienced a loss from which
they have never recovered ; while Germany, Holland,
and England received arts before unknown among
them, and an accession of the finest manhood. No
country owes more to her toleration than England.^
For nearly two hundred years, a stream poured in of
the best continental types, — Dutch, French, German,

I History of the XVIIIth Century, I, p. 203. 2 ma., p. 206, etc.

172 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

and, after Cromwell, Jewish, — until the commercial
classes were thoroughly pervaded by them. About
1700, there were in London thirty-five Huguenot
churches, and many elsewhere. The hospitality of
the native English, indeed, to strangers has been far
enough from generous. Chaucer commemorates the
hostility of the common people of his time to the
Flemings ; ^ and long after the fourteenth century,
many an industrious alien lost home and even life in
riots born of jealousy. Usually, however, worthy
immigrants could find foot-hold and thrive : if par-
ents suffered, the children grew thoroughly into Eng-
lish speech and ways, while inheriting skill and
industrious habits that had come from beyond sea.
Such refugees, especially numerous after the Eevoca-
tion of the Edict of Nantes, threw their influence to
a man, on the side of the Whigs : their persecutions
came from Kings who were friends and allies of the
Stuarts : what patience could they have with the
idea of the divine right ? To a man, also, the refugees
became non-conformists ; for aside from the Toryism
of the establishment, what attraction could a church
so near in its constitution and rites to the Cathol-
icism they loathed, possess for men so strongly Prot-
estant !

At the opening of the eighteenth century, the Whigs
were full of ability and energy, and it was all required
Doubtful ^o^ ^^^ battle to be waged. The Tories
twefn wbTgs "^-cre powerful and probably in the majority,
and Tories. ^j^^ would havc SO far prevailed as to over-
whelm the cause of the people but for a fortunate
chain of circumstances. William and Mary, the only

1 Nonues Prestes Tale.

THE REVOLUTION OF 1688. 173

man and the only woman of the evil line proceeding
from Darnley and Mary Queen of Scots, who have
possessed real character and ability, died without
issue. By a happy chance, the Pretender, the alleged
son of James II, weak and vicious in all his qualities,
and rigidly Catholic, was of doubtful birth. There
was reason for believing that he had been a suppositi-
tious child, and this suspicion under which he lay
prevented the zealous action of the Tory disposition.
Could it have been made certain that the Pretender
was a Stuart, there were enough upholders of the
doctrine of divine right to carry him triumphantly
into power, though the worthlessness of the_ line had
proved to be so inveterate. The death of Anne was
a crisis about which the lover of freedom must read
even now with bated breath. The Protestant suc-
cession prevailed, but barely so. A race of princes,
the house of Brunswick, came in, of no mark, to be
sure, either as to virtues or gifts, but at least they
were pledged to constitutional rule. The right of
Parliament was not to be questioned, and the idea of
the jus divinum began to decline. As time passed,
the landed gentry, and in a great degree the clergy,
became reconciled to the Hanoverians. In 1745,
when for the last time a Stuart made an effort to gain
the English crown, his partisans, few and without
spirit, were suppressed.

-With the middle of the eighteenth century, the Eng-
lish political forms as we know them at the present
hour, were clearly apparent. It had become EstaWish-

•^ ■*■ -^ , ment of mod-

fixed that the supreme power in the state em forms m

^ ^ the English

was Parliament ; in Parliament stood over polity,
against each other the two great parties of Whigs

174 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

and Tories, the power shifting now to one, now to the
other. Parliament had taken to itself, in addition
to the legislative function, the executive function as
well ; a committee, appointed by the Sovereign from
the party for the time being in majority, known as
Rise of the the Ministry or Cabinet, exercised these

functions. This device of an executive
ministry, changing as power changes from one party
to the other, was adopted under William and Mary,
and under the name of Responsible Government, has
come to play a most important part in the polity of
the English-speaking world.

But the Revolution of 1688, though an event to be
thankful for, brought about only partial benefits.

The outcome under William and Mary

TJneatisf ac- "^

tory condition "was somethinff vcrv difterent from the

of Parliament. c ,

freedom for which the Ironsides had
schemed and fought, which Cromwell through all
his arbitrary course strove to make real, and for
which Vane laid his head upon the block. Absolut-
ism in the Sovereign was crushed out effectually,
but England fell into the hands of an aristocracy
and a plutocracy, the mass of the people being as
completely unrepresented in the government as in
many a despotism. King, Lords, and Commons
stood after the old fashion, for which Pym and
Hampden had struggled in the first years of the
Long Parliament. The power of the House of Com-
mons was largely increased, but the men who sat
upon the benches at St. Stephen's had ceased almost
to represent the nation at large. Li Earl Simon's
plan and for long after. Parliament had made sub-
stantially real once more the ancient national assem-

THE REVOLUTION OF 1688. 175

blies.- Each freeman indeed could not come himself
to the deliberations ; but each freeman had a voice
in determining who should stand in his place and
speak his will, — from each shire the two discreet
knights, from each borough the delegated burgess.
In the Parliament of the eighteenth century this
condition of things did not exist. It had come about
that a portion of the seats of the House of power of the
Commons were practically owned by great men rf*""*
nobles, who filled them with subservient "^'*'"'-
creatures. The nobles sat at the same time in the
House of Lords. To their direct power as peers,
therefore, was added a vast, indirect power, obtained
through their influence in the lower House, a power
so great that it approached the proportions of an
oligarchy.

Still another element in the nation had come to
wield a portentous influence. The growth of a great
commercial class was undoubtedly on the whole a
good, but it was not a good unmixed with evil.
Merchants and manufacturers became possessed of
wealth : the colonies and establishments of the large
trading companies in the West and in the Orient
offered opportunities to the bold and rapacious which
were eagerly embraced. Men grew rich at home, in
the East and West Indies, in America. Not satisfied
with riches, they desired also power. By the score
they bought their way into the House of Commons,
showing no scruple about employing corruption ; as
on the other hand the degenerate constituencies
had no scruple about accepting the bribes that were
offered. By the side of the vast power the nobles
had seized, *a dangerous plutocracy had placed it-

176 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

self. Tlie bearing upon the fortunes of Anglo-Saxon
freedom, of the condition of things which had come
to pass in the middle of the eighteenth century, is so
important as to require careful consideration.

ERA OF PARLIAMENTAEl CORRUPTION. 177

CHAPTER XII.

ERA OP PARLIAMENTARY CORRUPTION.
George 1, 1714. George II, 1727. George III, 1760.

In the middle of the eighteenth century no one
thought of questioning the principles of the Revolu-
tion of 1688. The doctrine of divine right
had fallen out of favor. Parliament was siSmty'^ot^™'
recognized as the supreme power in the ToriSfor
State. We have to consider now the de- tarycorrup-
generacy of Parliament, the extent to
which it had ceased to represent the nation and fallen
a prey to corruption. At an earlier time, when the
Sovereigns had been more powerful, there had been
little corruption: it was much cheaper to coerce or
intimidate a knave than to buy him. For a very dif-
ferent reason, there is little direct bu3dng of votes in
our own time. The nation now holds Parliament
strictly accountable to itself: everj^thing is thor-
oughlj'^ ventilated in the newspapers : public opinion
holds all in fear. But between the time when the
Kings influenced Parliament, and the time when
public opinion began to make itself felt, there was an
interval during which corruption was scarcely op-
posed. This interval extended from 1688 until the
close of the war with America, in 1783. The great

178 AKGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

parties were about equally concerned in the abuse :

the Tories were the first to begin it and the last to

give it up, but it was most vigorous under the Whigs.

The best men of the period connived at it.

stooping of ct • 1 ty TTT

honest men to Said King William to the remonstratinsr

bribery. ° O

Bishop Burnet: "Nobody hates bribery
worse than I ; but I have to do with a set of men
who must be managed in this vile way, or not at all.
I must strain a point, or the country is lost." Bribery
was never worse than under the ministry of Pelham,
1745 to 1754, a statesman undoubtedly of good pur-
poses and character. He, too, felt forced to pay
greedy and low-minded men not to ruin the country.
There were other men in places of power, of the most
honest dispositions, whose fingers, nevertheless, be-
came touched with the pitch: they were entirely
above receiving bribes themselves, but they felt
forced to bribe others.^

In the House of Commons, from the time of Simon
de Montfort, the two great divisions under which
the members were naturally classed were those of
county-members and borough-members. Taking each
class by itself, let us review, at some risk of repeti-
tion, the influences to which it had been exposed, and
the condition into which it had fallen at the time of
the accession of George III, in 1760.

The county-members were the knights-of-the-shire,

whom the constitutional historian has occasion to

mention so frequently as playincf a most

Degeneracy of t p x./o

the county rep- honorable and useful part. These were

resentatives. •*■

elected in the shire-moots, in which in early

1 Macaulay : History of England, III, p. 429, etc. Green: History of
the English People, IV, p. 125, etc.

ERA OF PARLIAMENTARY CORRUPTION. 179

times appeared not only great proprietors, but a multi-
tude of small free-holders, the independent yeomen,
that body of the population drawing its blood to
such an extent from the ancient Anglo-Saxon sources,
and retaining to such an extent the ancient Anglo-
Saxon traditions. That the knights-of-the-shire in
early times were stanch spokesmen for freedom, was
undoubtedly due to the fact that the constituencies
which sent them to Westminster were composed so
largely of yeomen. In the middle of the fifteenth cen-
tury, the golden age of the English yeo- uedmeofthe
manry, Fortescue declares that in no other yeo™*^-
country of Europe were the small landed proprietors
so numerous, and he attributes to this circumstance
a large part of the well-being of England.^ Through
trade, however, which became vigorous soon after, as
new lands and new seas were opened to commerce,
individuals grew rich, the increase of wealth result-
ing in the accumulation of great estates in which the
small free-holds began to be absorbed. The growth
of the woollen trade, with the high rate of agricul-
tural wages, under Henry VII, made it profitable to
turn arable land into pasture ; so that, instead of a
number of independent farmers a single shepherd
often became the administrator of a wide tract. This
process went on, until in Elizabethan times and after-
ward, there was bitter complaint because the farm-
steads of the yeomanry were becoming to such an
extent absorbed in sheepwalks. More, Ascham, Lati-
mer, Strafford, and Bacon, as we have seen, testified
to the evil, and there was legislation to counteract it.
At the time of the Civil War, the yeomen, though

1 De Laudibus Legum Angliae, XXIX.

180 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

diminished in numbers, still constituted, as we know,
an important part of tlie strength of the Parliament,
whose side they generally embraced. After the
Restoration, however, the diminution became more
rapid ; the small free-holders now and then rose into
the rank of county gentry ; but in far larger propor-
tion they gave up their farms, and fell into the con-
dition of peasants; in which case, as the franchise
depended upon owning land, they lost all political
power .^ The franchise in the shires, therefore, by the
middle of the eighteenth century had fallen

Assumptions . ^ "^

of the great mto the hauds of a comparativelv small

land-holders. ^ *^

number of land-holders, whose numerous
tenants and laborers had lost all voice in the public
management. These great land-holders were in part
nobles, already possessed of large political power as
members of the House of Lords ; in part, wealthy
traders or manufacturers with fortunes won in legiti-
mate commerce ; in part, men enriched through fortu-
nate speculation, through the labor of negro slaves,
or through the oppression of mild-mannered natives
in Hindostan. This great change in the character
of the county constituencies did not fail to affect,
and disastrously, the character of the representatives.
Nevertheless, the shire-members remained as of old,
the purest and most respectable body in the House of
Commons ,■ for the borough representation, exposed to
influences still more unfortunate, had sunk into a
condition far worse, as will now be shown.

1 Leoky, I, p. 7 ; he cites Eden : History of Working Classes, I, pp.
73, 115. Macaulay, Chap. III. Fiscjhel on the Constitution, pp. 315,
316. Thornton : Overpopulation, chapter on English Peasants. Bacon :
Henry VU, and True Greatness of Kingdoms.

ERA OF PARLIAMENTARY CORRUPTION. 181

The boroughs, even in the thirteenth century, ex-
hibited great irregularities in their constitutions.
City and borough courts corresponding to

1 T 1 1 • 11 in ^^"^ condition

hundred or shire moots, had probably once of thebor-

. , oughs.

existed, but few traces of them remained.^
There were municipalities in all stages of develop-
ment, large and small, ancient and recent ; and the limi-
tations of the suffrage among them were as various as
possible. In some, the right to vote was quite unre-
strained, possessed by all who paid a tax ; in others,
the right belonged to a small body which at the same
time was self-elective ; in legal phrase, a close cor-
poration. Between these two extremes, boroughs
could be found in numerous forms of intermediate
condition.

As time progressed, the tendency was to curtail,
rather than increase, the largeness of borough life.
Toward the end of the fifteenth century,

BeBtruction

especially, manv charters were issued by ofthepopu-

i- ^ ' 'i ^ '^ lar francuiae.

the Crown conferring the power of govern-
ment in municipalities upon councils that were either
close corporations or elected by a few of the wealthier
burgesses.. To these councils solely belonged the
right to choose the member of Parliament ; or some-
times to a still more restricted body known as the
" Selectmen." The people at large came to feel little
interest in the member in electing whom they had had
no voice ; and the member, on his part, felt no respon-
sibility to the people, looking to the handful who
chose him as his proper constituency. What oppor-
tunities for corruption were now opened became at
once apparent. The small cliques of electors, in the

2 Sir T. Erskine May : Constitutional History, II, Cliap. XV.

182 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

absence of all restraint from public opinion, could
easily be bought up by rich men, by nobles, or by the
Crown, and evils- began to prevail which lasted for
centuries. The rising power of Parliament induced
the Tudors to resort to an expedient especially preg-
nant with harm. Finding that court-bills could not
always be passed, they resorted, in order to manu-
facture a power for themselves, to the creation of
Rotten bor- "Totten boroughs "; that is, the conferring
oughs. q£ municipal privileges upon places of

small account, the representatives for which, ap-
pointed practically by dictation, were expected to
show subserviency to the power which nominated
them. Of such rotten boroughs, Henry VIII created
sixteen ; Edward VI, twelve ; Mary, eight ; and Eliza-
beth, thirty.^ To make it more sure that there should
be no disappointment as regards a representative of
proper quality, the of&ce of high steward was often
created in the boroughs, a functionary under the
Crown, who pretty much superseded the mayor and
council, and returned the member to Parliament
without reference to any other authority than his
own.

The Stuarts carried on the work which the Tudors
had begun, Charles II and James II annihilating
Their growth popular frccdom in the few corporations
dor/Ind'sui"" which retained some vestige of it. The
'"''^' parliamentary reformers of 1688 wished to

make the representative body a more faithful inter-
preter of the constituencies ; but it scarcely occurred
to them, apparently, that the constituent body might
be an unfaithful interpreter of the sense of the

1 Ransome : Rise of Constitutional Government in England, p. 113.

ERA OF PARLIAMENTARY CORRUPTION. 183

nation.^ In the towns and cities, the abuses con-
tinued. Small cliques or individuals held the power
and returned the members, and meantime many of
the towns were becoming important centres of wealth
and population. The people were shut out, while the
little knot of political masters, elected for life and
generally carrying on their proceedings in secrecy,
had no sense of responsibility to them.

At the time of the accession of George III, 1760,
the bad features of the borough representation had
become exaggerated to an alarminof ex- ..

oo & Abuses under

tent.2 Great towns like Leeds, Manches- ^^o'^eeiu.
ter, and Birmingham, which had come forward
suddenly through commercial prosperity, were not
represented at all. On the other hand, boroughs,
like Old Sarum, on Salisbury Plain, upon whose bor-
ders rise the silent blocks of Stonehenge, with sheep
nibbling the grass in the pasture at their base, but
with scarcely a human inhabitant, yet returned a
member to Parliament. In such a case there was no
pretence of election, the member being a mere nomi-
nee of the grandee who owned the territory. Where
there was a pretence of election, the franchise was
confined to very few, the tendency being to restrict it
more and more. At the boroughs of Buck- ^^^^ ^^ ^^^^
ingham and Bewdley, for instance, the right '"e'^a™- <-'"=•
of election was confined to the bailiff and twelve
burgesses. Bath and Salisbury were boroughs of
some importance, the seats of bishops ; but the fran-
chise was scarcely more extended in them. At the
town of New Shoreham, on the coast of Sussex, there

1 Macaulay : Histoiy of England, IV, p. 265.

2 May : Constitutional History, II, Chap. XV.

184 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

were about one hundred and fifty voters. The ma-
Case of New l^^^J o^ these had formed themselves into
Bhoreham. ^ club, for some Strange reason called the
" Christian Club," which made a practice of offering
their votes for sale, the avowed purpose being to
extort as much money as possible at every election
from the candidate brought in. In 1770, the mem-
bers of the club sold themselves for £35 (|175)
a piece, after haggling with a number of different can-
didates as to the price. The circumstances were so
outrageous that Parliament was forced to notice it;
a statute against bribery, of 1762, which had been
pretty much a dead letter, was put in force, and New
Shoreham was disfranchised for its conduct. It was
admitted at the time that there were many similar
cases. Sudbury, indeed, in Suffolk, pub-
licly advertised itself. Oxford, seat of the
university though it was, was sold by its corporation,
which had absorbed all power, to the Duke of Marl-
borough and the Earl of Abingdon. The bargainers
were, indeed, prosecuted, like those of New Shore-
ham, but with a more fortunate issue for them : the
whole affair was laughed at as a huge joke and soon
Condition of forgottcu. Scotland was even worse off
Scotland. ijj^a^jj England. Edinburgh and Glasgow,
populous as they were, contained each but thirty-
three persons who had a voice in choosing the mem-
ber of Parliament. Not a borough existed in the
land which was not practically owned by some man
of wealth.

The facts cited show that, bad as the condition of
the county representation was, that of the boroughs
was generally worse. It was not always so : in some

ERA OF PARLIAMENTARY CORRUPTIOlir. 185

parts of Great Britain, the shires kept pace with the
municipalities in the race of degradation. The shire
of Bute, in Scotland, for instance, with &„,.,. .

' The snire of

population of fourteen thousand, had but ^'"^■
twenty-one electors, of whom only one was an actual
resident of the shire. At a Parliamentary election in
Bute, " only one person attended the meeting, except
the sheriff and returning-oflBcers. He, of course, took
the chair, constituted the meeting, called over the roll
of free-holders, answered to his own name, took the
vote as to Prseses, and elected himself. He then
moved and seconded his own nomination, took the
vote, and was unanimously returned." ^

A brief sketch has been given of the degradation
to which the House of Commons had fallen, a deg-
radation illustrated in great detail by the historians
to whom reference is made. The people of England
were quite unrepresented ; an actual majority of the
House of Commons was returned by a small body;
the best political traditions of the Anglo-Saxon race
appeared to be forgotten. When at length statistics
were presented with the idea of rousing the nation to
a sense of its condition, it was found that seventy
members were returned from thirty-five places in
which there were scarcely any electors at all ; that
ninety members were returned by forty-six places
vdth less than fifty electors ; and thirty-seven members
by nineteen places having not more than one hun-
dred electors. Of great peers, holding seats in the
upper House and at the same time largely controlling
the lower House, the Duke of Norfolk controlled the

1 May : Constitutional History, I, pp. 185, 186 (he quotes from Han-
sard's Debates).

186 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

election of seven members ; Lord Lonsdale, of nine ;
Lord Darlington, of seven ; the Duke of Rutland, of
six ; and so on through the aristocracy. As patrons
of boroughs or owners of vast estates in the shires,
they were politically omnipotent, being regarded by
the people, who had in large part lost all sense of
their ancient birthright, as their masters beyond
question. It was asserted at last that one hundred
and fifty-four individuals, forty-five of whom were
peers, returned a majority of the House of Commons.
Seats at Westminster became almost openly articles
of bargain and sale. Early in the century, a seat had
Price of Paiii- been held at £2500; under George III the
B^tf "^ price rose to £4000. This was due partic-
ularly to the rise of the " nabobs." Hun-
dreds of Englishmen had gone in quest of fortune to
the East and West Indies ; there, at the risk of health
and life, moved often by unscrupulous rapacity, they
wrung wealth from the toil of negro slaves, or the
oppression of gentle natives, who in the clutch of
Hastings, Clive, and their companions, were like
chickens in the claws of hawks. The portrait of the
^^ , , nabob was frequently drawn in the old

The nabobs. it i ^

plays and novels. Who does not know the
sallow, ill-tempered old curmudgeon, home at last from
his years of cruel over-reaching in a foreign land, with
no more morals or good-nature than liver, — a spirit-
ual and physical wreck, — his jaundiced face matching
his ill-gotten gold — the terror while he lives of a
group of toadying friends, who hope to pocket his
rupees when at last his grasp relaxes ? Scores of such
nabobs, in the time of George III, by bujdng their
way into Parliament, raised the price of seats. The

ERA OF PAKLIAMENTARY CORRUPTION. 187

country squires, who were comparatively respectable,
were overborne by the wealth of the returned adven-
turers ; even powerful nobles were no match for them.

Of course, representatives holding their seats by a
general system of corruption, or who were the mere
creatures of some great Lord of Broad-acres, could
seldom turn out to be high-minded, independent leg-
islators. They could scarcely fail to be themselves
subservient or corrupt. The bestowing of places,
pensions, and actual bribes for parliamentary service
was a matter of course. The best men in England,
though with eyes open to the evil, felt forced to take
part in it. Reference has been made to the feeling of
King WUliam and of Pelham. The great Sir Samuel
Romilly, at a later time, the man who had
the chief hand in reforming the old san- sirSamuei
guinary criminal code by which even petty
. larceny might be punished with the death penalty,
wrote : " This buying of seats is detestable ; and yet
it is almost the only way in which one in my situation,
who is resolved to be an independent man, can get
into Parliament. To come in by a popular election
in the present state of the representation is quite
impossible; to be placed there by some great lord,
and to vote as he should direct, is to be in a state of
complete dependence ; and nothing remains but to
owe a seat to the sacrifice of part of one's fortune.
It is true that many men who buy seats do it as a
matter of pecuniary speculation, as a profitable way
of employing their money ; they carry on a political
trade ; they buy their seats and sell their votes." ^

In the middle of the eighteenth century, then, Parlia-

1 May: Constitutional History, I, p. 276.

188 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ment was supreme, but it had ceased to represent tlie

people. The meanest motives told upon it,

unrepre- and pupcliase had become more and more

sented. ^

the means of entering it. Walpole, prime
minister from 1721 to 1742, organized corruption into
a system ; and the Duke of Newcastle, prime minister
from 1754 to 1761, based, without concealment, his
power upon bribery and borough-jobbing. These were
Whig administrations. Under George III, the Tories
did no better, =625,000 being spent, sometimes, in a
single day to influence votes. The moral tone of
public life was profoundly lowered : the social condi-
tion of the people, moreover, deprived of the suffrage,
and influenced by the demoralizing example set by
those high in station, sank rapidly toward the shame-
ful.i Was the nation unconscious of the disgrace
Avhich had come upon it ; and were no voices raised
for a reform of abuses ? By no means. The question
exciting most interest about the year 1750 was the
extreme corruption of Parliament, its subjection to
the executive, and the danger of its becoming the op-
pressor, not the representative, of the people. Many
began to think the country had gained little by
exchanging an arbitrary King for a Parliament cor-
rupt and tyrannical.2 In a few years we find Burke
exclaiming, "The value, spirit, and essence of a
House of Commons consists in its being the express
image of the feelings of the nation." Still more em-
phatically another declared: "This House is not a
representative of the people of Great Britain. It is
the representative of nomination-boroughs, of ruined

1 D. B. Eaton : Journal of Social Science, V, 1.
2 Lecky : XVmth Century, II, p. 470.

ERA OF PARLIAMENTARY CORRUPTION. 189

and exterminated towns, of noble families, of wealthy
individuals, of foreign potentates," and lie denounced
the abuses.! Such, too, were the sentiments of the
great Earl of Chatham.

The case of Wilkes, first heard of in 1761, produced
the deepest popular agitation. Wilkes, a man of
ability, and a strong champion of freedom, ^^^ ^^
though unfortunately his character was not '^'^^''■
good, had been legally chosen to Parliament in Lon-
don. Parliament, assuming an authority which it had
neyer possessed, twice declared Wilkes incapable, —
action which the people on their part met with ener-
getic remonstrance, ending twice with a re-election
of their rejected favorite. Great radical associations
were formed. With the disturbances of this time
began the influence of public meetings on

^ . , MaBB-meetings.

politics. In towns masses gathered, as m
the case of the Middlesex electors ; in the counties,
too, were great assemblies, as in the case of the York-
shire free-holders ; and in these vast meetings it
became a familiar cry that the House of Commons did
not represent the people. The people at the same
period discovered still another channel by which they
could make their power felt. For the first time the
debates in Parliament were made public. Secrecy
being now destroyed, a salutary feeling of responsi-
bility was forced upon members, who found them-
selves called sharply to account before a tribunal for
which until now they had cared but little. The first
great newspapers, moreover, were coming into exis-
tence ; and these forthwith, as organs of public opinion,
began a course of criticism upon public men, exasper-
i J. R. Green: History of the English People, IV, p. 205, etc.

190 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ating, often undiscriminating, and yet on the whole
most beneficent. As the second half of the eighteenth
century proceeded, a powerful party began to manifest
itself, determined that Anglo-Saxon liberty should not
be destroyed without a struggle. The party com-
prised a portion of those not disfranchised, — a few
indeed of the great nobles : the mass of its members,
however, were the unrepresented millions, the multi-
tude so long subjected to the encroachments of the
rich and great, until now they were quite thrust out
of their rights. It was a party numerous, able, and
quite ready to do valiant battle.

Nevertheless, the danger to freedom was appalling.
The influence of foreign opinion and example were
Dangers to almost whoUy f or despotism. In the coun-
freedom. ^^^^^ ^^ Europc, wliat liberties had ever
existed in the past were now completely wrecked.
Popular freedom in Spain, Italy, and France had
long ago disappeared. More recently most of the
freedom of the towns of Flanders, Germany,^ and
along the Baltic had been destroyed or transmuted
into forms thoroughly inefficient : the Swiss cantons
lay under the dominion of a narrow oligarchy.^ In
the Old World, it was only the Liberals of England
who remembered and were disposed to strive for
popular freedom. Disfranchised as they were, op-
posed at home by the rich, the learned, the well-
born, entrenched in places of power and headed by a
King of despotic disposition, whose capacity for mis-
chief was increased by the circumstance that he was
morally respectable and possessed some force of char-
acter who will say that the outlook was not most

1 Lecky : XVIIIth Century, III, p. 242.

ERA OF PARLIAMENTARY CORRUPTION. 191

critical ? So thought, at any rate, many a lover of
liberty, and some made preparations to expatriate
themselves, as was done by the founders of New
England when Laud and Strafford seemed likely
to carry through their policy of Thorough. How
Anglo-Saxon freedom in this crisis was saved to
England and to the world is a very memorable story.

192 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE COMING ON OF THE AMEEICAN KBVOLUTION.
1700-1776.

The English colonies on the Atlantic seaboard of

America, from feeble beginnings, had become in a

century and a half communities populous

th°eVhi?t'een and fuU of resourccs ; but holding little

Uolonies in ... • , i i , i i

the first half Communication with each other, and vary-
teenth oen- ing much in Spirit and polity. In Massa-
chusetts, which had absorbed Plymouth,
and which also comprised Maine, thus becoming by
far the most important colony of the North, the
people were distributed among two hundred towns,
each governing itself in its town-meeting, which re-
produced with curious accuracy the moot-government
of the primitive Teutonic community. As each Teu-
tonic tun sent representatives to the higher moot, so
each Massachusetts town sent a representative to a
central assembly at Boston. There the deputies
met a Crown-appointed governor, and also a council,
in constituting which both assembly and governor
had a voice. After the same general plan were
ordered the remaining New England colonies. The
oligarchic features of the earlier years had quite dis-
appeared ; not only church-members, but each reputa-
ble freeman had a vote ; and, except for some restraint

COMING ON OF AMERICAlSr REVOLUTION. 193

imposed by the Sovereign, the polity was thoroughly
democratic, a resuscitation of forms most ancient.

Virginia, on the other hand, by far the most impor-
tant colony of the South, resembled in her constitu-
tion contemiporary England. A class of great plan-
ters, forming a landed gentry, possessed the territory
and also all political power; while a numerous body
below them was without estates and also without
voice in the political management. While here and
there divisions could be made out corresponding to
the contemporary English parishes, like them called
parishes and each governed by its vestry, the real unit
of political life was the county, administered by its
Court of Quarter Sessions, closely similar to the
institution of the same name, which, in the mother-
country, had replaced, except for elective purposes,
the shire-moot. In one respect, Virginia differed
widely from the mother-country, — full half her popu-
lation were negro slaves. For a central government
there was a governor, a council, and a representative
assembly. After the same general plan as that of
Virginia were ordered the other Southern colonies.

In the middle colonies, both society and institutions
were far from homogeneous. In New York, to the
original Dutch, the English had been added, and to
these again a German element ; the young city at the
mouth of the Hudson was made up of waifs of all
nations. On portions of the territory stood towns
scarcely differing from those of New England; on
other portions, the great manors of the patroons ; on
still others, some simple patriarchal form of commu-
nity. In Pennsylvania and Maryland, the state was
distinctly feudal, the territory having been given to

194 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

great proprietors who stood almost in the relation of
suzerain to a great body of tenants. In Pennsylvania,
the principal stock had been English Quakers ; but a
stream of Irish, Scotch, and German immigration had
poured into the back settlements, wliich showed often
small respect for the authority or the instructions of
William Penn. Here the ancient shire-moot had
reappeared with noteworthy vigor. In Maryland
the proprietary was a Catholic, and the colony was
largely of Catholic refugees. Circumstances, how-
ever, had induced Lord Baltimore, a man of liberal
instincts, to practise a quite un-Roman toleration.
Maryland harbored Puritan, Episcopalian, and unbe-
liever, — a company quite too motley in character for
a harmonious social condition. For each of the
middle colonies, too, there was a governor, council,
and assembly. The Thirteen Colonies had at least
this point in common, that in each colony there was
an element, and it was sometimes the ruling element,
of men and women who for conscience' sake had fled
westward to avoid persecution. Sometimes it was
the persecution of a hostile church ; sometimes of a
tyrannical prince ; sometimes of the English Coromon-
wealth. Such people were sure to be earnest and of
sturdy moral fibre. Probably no nation ever started
on its career with a larger proportion of strong
characters, or a higher level of moral convictions.^

How, precisely, did it come about that the Thirteen
Colonies declared themselves independent?^ In the

1 Lecky : XVIIIth Century, II, p. 2.

2 In the discussion that follows, I am greatly indehted to the able
chapter by Hon. Mellen Chamberlain, in Winsor : Narrative and Criti-
cal History of America, VI, p. 1, etc.

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 195

fifteenth century, by public law of all civilized nations,
all unoccupied lands in newly discovered
countries belonged to the Crown, under The approach

° of the Ameri-

whose authority the discoveries had been <=?» Kevoiu-
made. The English colonies were held by
the lawyers to belong to the Crown and not to the
people, and the Crown, in* their view, had a right to
govern or dispose of them without interference of Par-
liament. The colonists were not under parliamentary
jurisdiction, but responsible only to the Kings ; they
possessed only such rights as their charters gave
them; and these charters the Crown claimed the
right to amend or revoke as it chose, though usually
not without much discontent on the part of the col-
onists. James I amended the Virginia charter in
1624, and Charles II revoked that of Massachusetts
in 1684, while William III gave to Massachusetts a
new charter quite different in its provisions from its
predecessor. Originally, these charters were simply
incorporations of trading-companies, and when they
were "perverted" into instruments of government,
as the trading enterprises grew into the dimension of
States, the Kings continued to feel that they could
do with the documents as they chose. The colo-
nists, claiming that they had "the rights and privi-
leges of Englishmen," among which was the right to
be free from arbitrary interference, resisted the med-
dling of the princes; still, the pretensions of the
princes by all judicial authority, were strictly legal.
In the eye of the law, the colonists when disposed to
resist were of a revolutionary temper.

The Kings claimed the right to rule the colonies
without parliamentary interference, but they were not

196 AJSTGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

consistent. Charles II, for instance, allowed the par-
liamentary acts of Navigation, laws greatly
o?°the'King7 restricting commerce, to be enforced in
Si'ete'.'"' ™'°" the colonies ; and in the time of William
and Mary, colonial affairs were to a large
extent transferred from the management of the Privy
Council, the King's creation, to the Board of Trade,
a council of commerce created by Parliament. Among
the colonists, also, the general doctrine was that they
owed allegiance to the King and not to Parliament :
they received the Crown-appointed governor, and
were accustomed to see the laws of their own assem-
blies sometimes set aside by royal authority ; a mem-
orable presentation of this doctrine, from the colonial
point of view, was that made by Franklin, before the
bar of the House of Commons at the time of the
Stamp Act agitation in 1766. Still, the colonists
were no more consistent here than the Kings. Story
brings up the fact, that in 175T, the General Court
of Massachusetts distinctly admitted the authority
of Parliament ; so, too, in 1761 ; and even so late as
1768, it was admitted " that his Majesty's high Court
of Parliament is the supreme legislative power over
the whole empire." ^

The fact is, that, as regards the exact legal and
constitutional status of the colonies, all were at sea,
both in the colonies and at home. The Kings were
uncertain, as appears from their consenting now and
then to parliamentary interference. The colonists
were uncertain, claiming now more, now less. In
the meantime. Parliament, become oligarchic and
greatly invigorated during the decline of the royal

1 Story on the Constitution, Chap. XVI, § 188.

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 197

prestige in the early Hanoverian days, assumed more
and more power, taking upon itself at last jurisdic-
tion over the colonies as a matter of course.

Had there been only political misunderstandings,
however, the colonies would never have been sepa-
rated from the mother-country. In two The ecciesias-

11111 ^''^^^ griev-

other ways their love had become es- ^^"o-
tranged. First, as regards ecclesiastical matters, the
destruction in Massachusetts through the new char-
ter granted by William, of the "theocracy," so-
called because it was a form of government in which
only church-members were admitted to hold office or
vote, was a severe shock to Puritan feeling. The
grievance was kept alive through the toleration, en-
forced upon the Puritans, of all sects but Roman
Catholics ; as the eighteenth century advanced, the
possibility of the introduction of a bishop and a
church establishment appeared, which caused deep-
seated resentment. In Virginia, too, there was eccle-
siastical trouble, but of a quite different sort. In
Virginia, there was no hatred of Prelacy ; her faith
from the first, on the contrary, had been Episco-
palian. Soon after the middle of the eighteenth
century, however, there had been interference from
England with the manner in which the clergy were
paid, — interference causing much exasperation, and
which is best remembered now as having given to
Patrick Henry his first opportunity. In the other
colonies, the ecclesiastical grievance weighed little,
if at all. 'Connecticut rfetained its old charter, con-
veniently hidden in the hollow of an oak when a
royal hand had been stretched out to seize it ; and,
besides, Connecticut, more liberal than Massachu-

198 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

setts, had from the first given the franchise to the
inhabitants in general, with no restriction of it to
church-members. In New York, motley in faith as
in population, the church question played but a small
part in politics ; while in Pennsylvania and Mary-
land, the terms of the grants to Penn and Lord
Baltimore, respectively, had been more or less will-
ingly acquiesced in by the proprietors and their ten-
antry from the first.

But a second stone of offence, which, unlike the
ecclesiastical one, affected all America, existed in the
Thecommer- ^^^^^ regulations. Says Arthur Young:
ciai grievance, u jsfothing cau be more idle than to say that
this set of men, or the other administration, or that
great minister, occasioned the American war. It was
not the Stamp Act or the repeal of the Stamp Act ;
it was neither Lord Rockingham nor Lord North, —
but it was that baleful spirit of commerce that
wished to govern great nations on the maxims of the
counter." ^ It has been seen how powerful in Eng-
land the mercantile class had become, a most excel-
lent element, the growing influence of which marked
the surrender by the world of worn-out medisevalism,
and the taking on of the modern spirit. The mer-
cantile class had been largely recruited by the new
blood which had been poured into England, — Hugue-
not, Fleming, German, Hebrew. With the Whigs
and the non-conformists, it threw its weight power-
fully against the influence of the Tories and the
Anglican Church, contributing much to the rejection
of the doctrine of the divine right of Kings, and to
the ascendency of Parliament. No good, however,

I Quoted by Bancroft.

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 199

is unmixed with evil : tlie spirit of commerce is
often excessively selfish and capable of

- , , T A ■ r . SelfiehDesB of

producing harm. In America, lor in- th? spirit of
stance, the English traders and manufac-
turers tried to subordinate colonial interests to their
own, with ruthless disregard of the welfare of all
but themselves. Soon after the middle of the sev-
enteenth century began a series of enactments by
Parliament, which were continued down to the out-
break of the American Revolution, — enactments
designed to pour profit into pockets at home, at the
expense of the population living in the dependencies.
These were, first, the Navigation Laws,^ which
weighed heavily upon the carrying-trade ; and, second,
the legislation brought about by the Board of Trade,
an institution established with considerable powers
m the time of William and Mary, to which were com-
mitted the interests of commerce and a general over-
sight of the colonies. Adam Smith was stiU in the
far future, and the policy constantly pursued was
neither humane nor wise. We may judge of the
temper of the Board from the fact that even John
Locke, its wisest and one of its most influential
members, solemnly advised William to appoint a
captain-general over the colonies with dictatorial
power ; and the whole Board recommended, in 1701,
a resumption of the colonial charters and the intro-
duction of such " an administration of government
as shall make them duly subservient to England."

I See summary of them in Adam Smith : Wealth of Nations, II, p.
201. In the account here given of the coming on of the American Revo-
lution, the writer follows, with some modification, his life of Samuel
Adams, (American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII, Chap. VI,) which see
for fuller details.

200 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

The welfare of the colonies was systematically sac-
rificed to the aggrandizement of the gains of English
manufacturers and merchants. Sometimes the pro-
visions turned out to the advantage of the colonies :
they were restricted to English markets, but they
had a monopoly of those markets. More frequently
there was oppression without any compensating
good.

Restrictions, like the Act of 1719, against the hat
manufacture, designed for -securing to the mother-
country a monopoly of the colonial trade, crushed
out every industry that could compete with those of
England. For such products as they were permitted
to raise, the colonies had no lawful market but Eng-
land, nor could they buy anywhere, except in England,
the most important articles which they needed. "With
the French West India Islands a most profitable in-
tercourse had sprung up, the colonists shipping thither
lumber and provisions, and receiving in return sugar
and molasses, the consumption of which latter article,
in the widespread manufacture of rum, was very
large. In 1733 was passed the famous " Sugar Act,"
the design of which was to help the British West
The Sugar Indies at the expense of the Northern colo-
■^°'- nies, and by which trade with the French

islands became generally unlawful, so that no legiti-
mate source of supply remained open but the far less
convenient English islands. The restrictions, indeed,
were not and could not be enforced. Every sailor
was a smuggler ; every colonist knew more or less of
illicit traffic or industry. The demoralization came
to pass which always results when a community, even
with good reason, is full of law-breakers, and the dis-

COMING ON OP AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 201

position became constantly more and more unfriendly
toward the mother-country.

The Board of Trade, however, the main source of
the long series of acts by which the English depen-
dencies were systematically repressed, should receive
execration not too severe. They simply were not in
advance of their age. When, after 1688, the com-
mercial spirit gained an ascendency quite new in
England, the colonists, far off, little known, and de-
spised, were pitched upon as fair game, if they could
be made to yield advantage. In so using them, the
men in power were only showing what has so often
passed as patriotism, that mere expansion of selfish-
ness, inconsistent with any broad Christian sentiment,
which seeks wealth and might for the state at the
expense of the world outside. It was inhumanity
from which the world is rising, it may be hoped,
for which it would be wrong to blame those men of
the past too harshly. The injustice, however, as
always, brought its penalty ; and in this case the
penalty was the utter estrangement of the hearts of a
million of Englishmen from the land they had once
loved, and the ultimate loss of a continent.

Before the settlements, it had been stipulated in
the charters that all the colonists were to have the
rights and privileges of Englishmen, and

° TO • 1 T,;r Therightsand

this provision they often cited. Magna privileges oi

r •/ o Englishmen.

Charta, as we have seen, was but a confir-
mation of what had stood in and before the time of
Edward the Confessor, — the primitive freedom, in-
deed, which had prevailed in the German woods.
This had been again and again confirmed. Docu-
ments of Edward I and Edward III, the Petition of

202 ANGLO-SAXON FKEEDOM.

Right of 1628, the Bill of Rights of 1689, had given
such re-confirmation. The colonists all knew this in
a general way. Especially the descendants of the
twenty thousand Puritans knew it, who, coming over
between 1620 and 1640, had been the seed from which
sprang the race of New Englanders. They were to
the full as intelligent in perceiving what were the
rights of Englishmen, and as tenacious in upholding
them, as any class that had remained in the old
home. Left to themselves for sixty years, they little
needed to assert their rights ; but when at last inter-
ference began from across the water, it was met at the
outset by protest. Parliament is a thousand leagues
of stormy sea away from us, said they. That body
cannot judge us well ; most of all, our representatives
have no place in it. We owe allegiance to the King,
indeed ; but instead of Parliament, our General Court
shall tax and make laws for us. Such claims, often
asserted, though overruled, were not laid aside, and
at length, in 1766, we find Franklin asserting them as
the opinion of America at the bar of the House of
Commons. It cannot be said that New England was
consistent here, as has been seen, but this was the
general doctrine.

The sum and substance is that as to the constitu-
tional rights of the colonists, the limits were, in par-
ticulars, quite undetermined, both in the minds of
English statesmen, and also among the colonists them-
selves. What " the privileges and rights of English-
men " were was not always clearly outlined, and the
student finds sometimes more, sometimes less, insisted
on, according as the temper toward the Old World
is embittered or good-natured. As events progress.

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 203

through fear of prelatical contrivings and through
bad trade regulations, as has been seen, the tone
becomes more and more exasperated. On the one
side the spirit becomes constantly more independent ;
on the other side the claims take on a new shade of
arrogance. When the first decided steps toward the
Revolution occur in 1764, in the agitations connected
with the Stamp Act, the positioris in general of the
parties in dispute may be set down as follows : " Par-
liament asserted the right to make laws to bind the
colonies in all cases whatsoever ; the colonies claimed
that there should be no taxation without representa-
tion, and that, since they had no representatives in
Parliament, they were beyond its jurisdiction."

The fall of Quebec in 1759 was an important crisis
in the history of the colonists. They had learned to
estimate their military strength more Effect of the
highly than ever before. Side by side orFrTnch"
with British regulars, they had fought ^°'""' ,
against Montcalm and proved their prowess. Officers
qualified by the best experience to lead, and soldiers
hardened by the roughest campaigning into veterans,
abounded in all the towns. A more independent
spirit appeared, and this was greatly strengthened by
the circumstance that the destraction of the power of
France suddenly put an end to the incubus which,
from the foundation of things, had weighed upon
New England, viz. the dread of an invasion from the
, North. Coincident with this great invigoration of
the tone of the colonies were certain changes in the
English policy; changes which came about very
naturally, but which, in the temper that had begun
to prevail, aroused fierce resentment. As the Seven

204 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Years' War drew towards its close, it grew plain that
England had incurred an enormous debt ; her respon-
sibilities, moreover, had largely increased. All India
had fallen into her hands, as well as French America.
At the expense of her defeated rival, her dominion
was immensely expanding. Vast was the glory, but
vast also was the care and the financial burden. A
faithful, sharp-eyed minister, George Grenville, seeing
well the needs of the hour, and searching as no pred-
ecessor had done into the corruptions and slack-
nesses of administration, at once fastened upon the
unenforced revenue laws as a field where reform
was needed. Industry on land, as we have seen, was
badly hampered in a score of ways, and on the sea
the wings of commerce were cruelly chpped.

Grenville's imprudence was as conspicuous as his

eye was keen and his fidelity persistent. As the

first step in a series of financial measures

of customs which should enable England to meet her

regulations.

enormous debt and her great expenses, he
set in operation a vigorous exaction of neglected
customs and imposts. The vessels of the navy on
the American coast were commissioned to act in the
service of the revenue, each officer becoming a cus-
toms official. At once all contraband trade was sub-
jected to the most energetic attack, no respect being
shown to places or persons. In particular, the Sugar
Act, by which an effort had been made to cut off the
interchange of American lumber and provisions for.
the sugar and molasses of the French West Indies,
was strongly enforced, and the New England sailors,
with the enterprising merchants of Boston, Newport,
Salem, and Portsmouth behind them, flamed out into

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 205

the fiercest resentment. Whereas for many a year
the collectors, from their offices on the wharves, had
winked placidly at the full cargoes from St. Domingo
and St. Christopher, brought into port beneath their
very eyes, now all was to be changed in a moment.
Each sleepy tide-\yaiter suddenly became an Argus,
and, backed up by a whole fleet-full of rough and
ready helpers, proceeded to put an end to the most
lucrative trade New England possessed.

To help forward this new activity in the carrying
out of laws so often heretofore a dead letter, certain
legal forms known as " writs of assistance " -^vrits ot ab-
were recommended, to be granted by the ^'^'*'"=*-
Superior Court to the officers of the customs, giving
them authority to search the houses of persons sus-
pected of smuggling. The employment of such a
power, though contraband goods were often no doubt
concealed in private houses, was regarded as a great
outrage. Writs of assistance in England were legal
and usual: if they are ever justifiable, English au-
thorities said then, and still say, they are justifiable
under such circumstances as prevailed in America.
All this was met by fierce resistance.

Inasmuch as the American colonies had profited
especially from the successes of the war, it had been
felttjustly enough that they should bear a portion of
the burden. It might have been possible to secure
from them a good subsidy, but the plan devised for
obtaining it was unwise. The principle was univer-
sally admitted that Parliament had power to levy
" external " taxes, those intended for the regulation
of commerce. With the Stamp Act, in The stamp
1764, Grenville had taken a step farther. ^''''

206 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

This was an " internal " tax, one levied directly for
the purpose of raising a revenue, not for the regula-
tion of commerce. The unconscious Grenville ex-
plained his scheme in an open, honest way. " I am
not, however," said he to the colonial agents in
London, " set upon this tax. If the Americans dis-
like it and prefer any other method, I shall be con-
tent. Write, therefore, to your several colonies, and
if they choose any other mode, I shall be satisfied,
provided the money be but raised." But Britain,
pushing thus more earnestly than heretofore, found
herself, much to her surprise, confronted by a stout
and well-appointed combatant, not to be browbeaten
or easily set aside.

No one was more astonished than Grenville that
precisely now an opposition so decided should be
called out. He had meant to soften his measures by
certain palliatives. For the Southern colonies the
raising of rice was favored; the timber trade and
hemp and flax in the North received substantial
encouragement ; most important of all measures, the
restrictions were taken from the American whale-
fishery even though it was quite certain under such
conditions to ruin that of the British Isles. Gren-
ville felt that he had proceeded prudently. He had
asked advice of many Americans, who had made no
objection to, and in some cases had approved, the
Stamp Act. Men of the best opportunities for know-
ing the temper of the colonies, like Shirley, fifteen
years governor of Massachusetts, and for a time com-
mander-in-chief of all the military forces in America,
had decidedly favored it. Nothing better than the
Stamp Act had been suggested, though Grenville had

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 207

invited suggestions as to substitutes. America, how-
ever, was in a ferment, and England, too, for one
reason or another, was in a temper scarcely less threat-
ening. Something must be done at once. But the
responsibility was taken out of the hands of Gren-
ville : a new ministry had come into power, and he
was once more a simple member of Parliament.

The new premier was the Marquis of Rockingham,
a young statesman of liberal principles and excellent
sense, though with a strange incapacity for expressing
himself, which made him a cipher in debate. The
secretary of state, in whose department especially
came the management of the colonies, was General
Conway, a brave officer and admirable man, and well
disposed toward America. On the 14th of January,
1765, began that debate, so memorable both on account
of the magnitude of the issues involved, ^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^
and the ability of the disputants who took the'st^p'""
part. A few Americans, Franklin and ■*^°''
other colonial agents among them, listened breath-
lessly in the gallery, and transmitted to their country
a broken, imperfect report of all the superb forensic
thunder. Whoever studies candidly the accounts
cannot avoid receiving a deep impression as to the
power and substantial good purpose of the great
speakers, and as to the grave embarrassments that
clogged them in striving to point out a practicable
course. The agitation out of which parliamentary
reform was to come was already in the air. While
none of the actors in the scene appreciated the depth
of the gulf into which England was sinking, all
evidently felt the pressure of evil. Mansfield appears
ready at one point to admit abuse, but deprecates inter-

208 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ference witli the constitution, while Pitt denounces
the " rotten boroughs," and declares that they must
be lopped off.

Edmund Burke made upon this occasion his maiden
speech, but no one thought it worth while, in those
days before systematic reporting had. be-
gun, to record the words of the unknown
young man. Pitt, who followed him, hushed all
into attention as he rose in his feebleness, his elo-
quence becoming more touching from the
strange disease by which he was afflicted,
and which he was accused of using purposely to in-
crease the effect of his words; he first praised the
effort of the new member, and then proceeded in
that address so worthy of his fame. Pitt's advice
was that the Stamp Act should be repealed abso-
lutely and immediately, but at the same time that
the sovereignty of England over the colonies should
be asserted in the strongest possible terms, and be
made to extend to every point of legislation, except
that of taking their money without consent.

" There is an idea in some that the colonies are
virtually represented in this House. They never
have been represented at all in Parliament. I would
fain know by whom an American is represented
here. Is he represented by any knight^of-the-shire
in any county of this kingdom? Would to God
that respectable representation were augmented by
a greater number ! Or will you tell me that he is
represented by any representative of a borough, a
borough which perhaps no man ever saw? This is
what is called the rotten part of the constitution;
it cannot endure the century. If it does not drop.

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 209

it must be amputated. The idea of a virtual repre-
sentation of America in tMs House is the most con-
temptible that ever entered into the head of a man.
It does not deserve a serious refutation."

Later in the winter, when the debate was renewed
in the House of Lords, Lord Camden, chief justice
of the Common Pleas, supported the views
of Pitt in a strain which the latter called
divine. He tried to establish by a learned citation
of precedents that the parts and estates of the realm
had not been* taxed until represented ; but as if he
felt that abuses had accumulated, he declared that,
if the right of the Americans to tax themselves
could not be established in this way, it would be
well to give it to them from principles of natural
iustice. Amonof those who replied, the

1 Ti-»r ^111-^ Mansfield.

most noteworthy was Lord Mansfield, chief

justice of England, who declared, in opposition to

Camden, that, —

" The doctrine of representation seemed ill-founded.
There are twelve million people in England and
Ireland who are not represented; the notion now
taken up, that every subject must be represented by
deputy, is purely ideal. There can be no doubt, my
lord, that the inhabitants of the colonies are as much
represented in Parliament as the greatest part of the
people of England are represented, among nine mil-
lion of whom there are eight million who have no
votes in electing members of Parliament. Every
objection, therefore, to the dependency of the col-
onies upon Parliament, which arises to it upon the
ground of representation, goes to the whole present
constitution of Great Britain, and I suppose it is not

210 ASTGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

meant to new-model that too ! A member of Parlia-
ment chosen by any borough represents not only the
constituents and inhabitants of that particular place,
but he represents the inhabitants of every other bor-
ough in Great Britain. He represents the city of
London and all other the Commons of this land and
inhabitants of all the colonies and dominions of Great
Britain, and is in duty and conscience bound to take
care of their interests."

When, after the speech of Mansfield, the subject
came to a vote in the House of Lords, the matter
stood in his favor by one hundred and twenty-five
to five. In the. Commons the majority on the same
side was as overwhelming.

Looking back upon this momentous debate after
a century and a quarter has elapsed, what are we to
The question ^^J ^ ^° ^^^ merits of it ? England has
summed up. completely changed since then her colo-
nial policy, but no sober second thought has induced
her historians to believe that the position of the gov-
ernment was plainly a wrong one. Pitt and Cam-
den turned the scale for us in the Stamp Act matter :
their declarations put backbone into the colonial
resistance, and disheartened the ministry in England ;
but Pitt's opinions were declared at the time to be
peculiar to himself and Lord Camden, and have ever
since, in England, been treated as untenable.^ Mans-
field's theory of "virtual representation," — that a
representative represents the whole realm, not merely
his own constituency, " all other the Commons of this
land, and the inhabitants of all the colonies and
dominions of Great Britain, and is in duty and con-

1 Massey: History of Reign ol George III, I, p. 262.

COMING ON OP AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 211

science bound to take care of their interests," — is de-
clared by another writer to be grandly true, though,
to be sure, somewhat overstrained as regards the
colonies. Burke, a few years afterwards, addressing
the electors of Bristol, developed the doctrine elab-
orately. Mansfield was right in urging that the
constitution knows no limitation of the power of Par-
liament, and no distinction between the power of
taxation and other kinds of legislation. The abstract
right, continues our historian, was unquestionably on
the side of the minister and Parliament who had
imposed the tax, and that right is still acted upon.
In 1868, in the trial of Governor Eyre of Jamaica,
the English Judge Blackburn decided " although
the general rule is that the legislative assembly has
the sole right of imposing taxes in the colony, yet
when the imperial legislature chooses to impose taxes,
according to the rule of English law they have a
right to do it." ^ Lecky says : —

" It was the first principle of the constitution, that
a member of Parliament was the representative not
merely of his own constituency, but also of the whole
empire. Men connected with, or at least specially
interested in the colonies, always found their way
into Parliament ; and the very fact that the colonial
arguments were maintained with transcendent power
within its walls was sufficient to show that the colo-
nies were virtually represented."

Lecky, however, even while thus arguing, admits
that the Stamp Act did unquestionably infringe upon
a great principle ; and he acknowledges that the doc-
trine, that taxation and representation are inseparably

1 Yonge : Constitutional History of England, p. 66.

212 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

connected, lies at the very root of the English con-
ception of political liberty. It was only by straining
matters that the colonies could be said to be virtu-
ally represented, and in resisting the Stamp Act the
principle involved was the same as that which led
Hampden to refuse to pay the ship-money.^

It is only fair for the present generation of Ameri-
cans to weigh arguments like those of Mansfield, and
to understand how involved the case was. The
statesmen of the time of George III were neither
simpletons nor utterly ruthless oppressors. They
were men of fair purposes and sometimes of great
abilities, not before their age in knowledge of national
economy and political science; still, however, sin-
cerely loving English freedom, and, with such light
as they had, striving to rule in a proper manner the
great realm which was given to them to be guided.
In ways which the wisest of them did not fully appre-
ciate, the constitution had undergone deterioration
through the carelessness of the people and the arbi-
trary course on the part of the ministers ; and it is
a mark of greatness in Camden, that, learned lawyer
though he was, he felt disposed to rest the cause of
the colonies on the basis of "natural justice," rather
than upon the technicalities with which it was his
province to deal. In the shock of the Stamp Act
and Wilkes agitations England came to herself, and
by going back to the primeval principles, started on
a course of reform by no means yet complete. At
that very time Richard Bland of Virginia, anticipair
ing by a century the spirit and methods of the
constitutional writers, of whom E. A. Freeman and

1 XVIIIth Century, III, p. 353, eto.

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 213

Bishop Stubbs are the best-known examples, uttered
sentences which might well have been taken as their
motto by the " Friends of the People," the " Society
of the Bill of Rights," and the other organizations in
England which just now or soon after began to be
active for the salvation of their country. He derived
the English constitution from Anglo-Saxon princi-
ples of the most perfect equality, which invested
every freeman with a right to vote.

" If nine-tenths of the people of Britain are deprived
of the high privilege of being electors, it would be a
work worthy of the best patriotic spirits of the nation
to restore the constitution to its pristine perfection." ^

Much as Pitt and Camden were admired, and pow-
erful as was their brave denunciation of the Stamp
Act and their demand for its repeal, their famous
position that a distinction must be made between
taxation and legislation, and that while Parliament
could not tax, it could legislate, seemed no more ten-
able to Americans than it did to Englishmen. The
colonial leaders, following, no doubt unconsciously,
the precedent of the thirteenth century, soon passed
on from demanding representation as a condition
of taxation, to demanding representation as a condi-
tion of legislation of every kind ; they denied utterly
the power of Parliament to interfere in any of their
affairs; they owed allegiance to the King, but of
Parliament they were completely independent. So
Franklin had already declared. This position was
shocking to Pitt, and he would have been as willing
to suppress its upholders as was Lord North himself.

It is making no arrogant claim to say that in all

1 Quoted by Bancroft

214 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

this preliminary controversy the American leaders
„ show a much better appreciation of the

Superior ap- ^^

American"'' principles of Anglo-Saxon liberty, and a
AngioX^xoi management much more statesmanlike,
freedom. than cveu the best men across the water.
It was to be expected. " Political power was incom-
parably more diffused ; the representative system in-
comparably less corrupt than at home." ^ As far as
New England is concerned, there is no denying the
oft-quoted assertion of Stoughton, that God sifted a
whole nation to procure the seed out of which the
people was to be developed. The colonists were
picked men and women, and the circumstances un-
der which they were placed at their arrival on these
shores forced upon them a revival of institutions
which in England had long been overlaid. The pop-
ular moot had reappeared in all its old vigor, and
wrought in the society its natural beneficent effect.
Together with intelligence and self-reliance in every
direction, it had especially trained in the people the
political sense. In utter blindness the Englishman of
our revolutionary period looked down upon the col-
onist as wanting in reason and courage. Really the
colonist was a superior being, both as compared with
the ordinary British citizen and with the noble.
Originally of the best English strain, a century and a
half of training, under the institution best adapted of
all human institutions to quicken manhood, had had
its effect. What influence had surrounded lord and
commoner across the water to develop in them a capa-
city to cope with the child of the Puritan, schooled
thoroughly in the town-meeting !

1 Lecky : XVIIIth Century, III, p. 296.

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 215

The discontent was most marked in Massachusetts.
Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire,
closely connected, took their tone from her. In New
York was a party prepared to go all lengths with the
most strenuous, step for step ; there was a party, too,
better placed as regards wealth and position, — the rich
merchants, the Episcopalians generally, the holders of
the great feudal estates, the Dutch farmers, and recent
German settlers, — who were either actively loyal to
the Crown or quite apathetic. In Pennsylvania, there
were strong opposers of the English policy, whose
leading representative, now that Franklin was ab-
sent in England, was John Dickinson, very famous
through the "Farmer's Letters," well-reasoned papers
in which was. given a popular explanation of the
unconstitutionality of government acts : the power-
ful sect of Quakers, however, as the trouble deepened,
set themselves against resistance to the powers that
were ; and the Germans felt little interest. Passing
to the South, Virginia was all alive. The aristocracy
of great tobacco-planters, who held the power, full of
vigor and trained to struggle in the long-continued
disputes with different royal governors, stood most
stubbornly against British encroachment. The col-
ony was far enough from democracy : the large class
of poor landless whites had scarcely more interest in
politics than the slaves ; but the House of Burgesses
understood well the championship of American priv-
ileges, and was prepared to second, even once or
twice to anticipate, Massachusetts in measures of
opposition. Influenced in the early days by Patrick
Henry, Richard Henry Lee, and Dabney Carr, it was
sometimes in advance of the Northern province, and

216 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

a little later, when Washington, Jefferson, and Mad-
ison came forward, it stood certainly foremost. In
South Carolina, too, was a party headed by Christo-
pher Gadsden, prepared to take the advanced ground.

In the preliminary years, however, Massachusetts
was very plainly before all others, according to the
LeaderBhip of ^^^w both of America and England.i If
^tta?"''"" sometimes another province was in advance
in taking a bold step, it was perhaps due to
the management of the skilful Massachusetts states-
men, who, for reasons of policy, held in check their
own assembly, that local pride elsewhere might be
conciliated, and America, generally, be brought to
present an unbroken front.

Discontent with England became rife in New

1 On this point, which local pride might dispute, a few authorities
may be cited. Englishmen at the time felt as follows: " In all the late
American disturbances, and in every thought against the authority of
the British Parliament, the people of Massachusetts Bay have taken the
lead. Every new move towards independence has been theirs ; and in
every fresh mode of resistance against the law they have first set the
example, and then issued out admonitory letters to the other colonies
to follow it." — Mauduit's Short View of the New England Colonies, p. 5.
See, also, Anburey's Travels, I, p. 310. Hutchinson : History of Massa-
chusetts Bay, HI, p. 257. Rivington : Independence the Object of Con-
gress in America, London, 1776, p. 15. Lord Camden called Massachusetts
" the ring-leading colony." Coming to writers of our own time, Lecky
declares. History of the Eighteenth Century, III, p. 386: "The central
and southern colonies long hesitated to follow New England. Massa-
chusetts had thrown herseU with fierce energy into the conflict, and
soon drew the other provinces in her wake." Says J. R. Seeley : Expan-
sion of England, pp. 154, 155 : "The spirit driving the colonies to sepa-
ration from England, a principle attracting and conglobing them into
a new union among themselves, — how early did this spirit show itself
in the New England colonies! It was not present in all the colonies.
It was not present in Virginia ; but when the colonial discontents burst
into a flame, then was the moment when Virginia went over to New
England, and the spirit of the Pilgrim Fathers found the power to turn
the offended colonists into a new nation."

COMING ON OF AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 217

England and Virginia before it appeared elsewhere
in America. The oppressive trade regulations bore
upon manufactures and commerce ; and since most
of the manufactures were in New England, and the
principal articles of export were New England tim-
ber and Virginia tobacco, those colonies first became
exasperated. The Stamp Act, however, bore upon
all, and from 1764 the backward colonies began to
show the same wrathful temper. To preserve strict
truth, the historian must not omit to state that a
certain discreditable reason had its part in bringing
about American resistance, as well as the just indig-
nation at the selfish and arbitrary policy which ground
the country down. A debt of eight or nine million
pounds was owed to British merchants, and this debt,
so some thought, in case of successful revolt, it might
be possible to repudiate.^

1 Madison's View, XL, and Boucher, quoted by Chamberlain, " John
Adams, the Statesman of the Revolution," p. 37.

218 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE AMERICAN EEVOLtrTION A STRUGGLE OE
PARTIES, NOT COUNTRIES.

1776-1783.

The condition of things in the middle of the
eighteenth century has been sufSciently set forth.
Character of Grcorge III had been educated carefully
George HI. uudcr the influence of his mother, a woman,
who, like the members of German royal families at
that time universally, exaggerated to the highest
degree the prerogatives of the King. Her constant
exhortation, " George, be a King," is said to have in-
fluenced her son much. Jacobitism had been utterly
quenched in 1745. No other prince since Charles II
had been hailed with such acclamation as George III,
when he took his seat. Whereas the prestige of the
Kings had been declining, prerogative and the jus
divinum now began to be fashionable again. The
Tories were in power, and the great Jacobite fami-
lies, giving up at last the cause of the Stuarts, ral-
lied round the Hanoverian prince, retaining all their
old anti-popular ideas. George was fairly sensible,
thoroughly brave, well-meaning, and sincerely anxious
to bring about good for England, not postponing the
interests of his kingdom, as his two predecessors had
done, to those of his German electorate. He was.

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 219

however, ignorant, narrow-minded, and arbitrary, and
was determined to make himself as absolute as the
Kings of Europe in general. He hesitated at no cor-
ruption, though he was himself honest, and by means
of the " King's Friends," a great body in Parliament
whom he won to himself by bribes, he grew very pow-
erful.

It is not right, however, to regard George III as a
fair representative of the England of his time, nor to
think that in the great war of the Ameri-
can Revolution, of which on the British Enguehmen

■ • with the

Side he was the central figure, Americans American

struggle.

were really fighting England. Says a mod-
em English authority : ^ " Of course, Americans regard
independence as their great achievement. In this
they are quite right. When, however, they proceed to
regard independence as a victory gained over England,
their enemy, they are surely egregiously in error. . . .
At the time the United States were fighting for inde-
pendence, England was fighting for her liberties:
the common enemy was the Hanoverian George III
and his Germanized Court. . . . When the news was
brought to London that the United States had ap-
pealed to arms, William Pitt, an Englishman, if
there ever was one, rose in his seat in Parliament, and
with uplifted voice thanked God that the American
colonists retained enough of English blood to fight for
their rights. Nine Englishmen out of every ten out-
side of Court influence similarly rejoiced. Independ-
ence day is as much a red-letter day for every genuine
Englishman as for every genuine American. And so
it should be : Washington but trod in the footsteps
1 Westminster Review, March, 1889.

220 ANGLO-SAXON FKEEDOM.

of Hampden ; his task was easier than that of Hamp-
den, and the solution he wrought, which an interval
of three thousand miles of ocean practically dictated,
was more thorough." The writer laments the es-
trangement of Americans from England. " England's
sternest, coldest, most critical censors, I have found
among descendants of the old settlers ; surely those
retain something of ancient Puritan bitterness. The
source of estrangement I am inclined to trace largely
to the fact that the average American reads no history
but United States history, and that he can scarcely
be said to study."

Vast misapprehension as to the true character of

the American Revolution ho doubt prevails : the

English Radical whose words have been

A Btrife on ^

both Bides of quoted puts the case none too strongly.

the ocean. . ^ ° ''

A high American authority ^ declares that
the American Revolution was not a quarrel between
two peoples, but a strife between two parties in one
people. Conservatives and Liberals. These parties
existed in both countries ; the battle between them
took place not only on the fields of America, but in
the British Parliament also, some of the fiercest en-
gagements in the latter arena. The strife took place
on both sides of the water with nearly equal step,
and was essentially the same on both sides ; so that
if, at the close of the French War, all the people of
Great Britain had been transported to America, and
all the people of America to Great Britain, and put
in control of British affairs, the American Revolu-
tion and the contemporary British Revolution might

1 Hon. Mellen Chamterlain, in Winsor : Narrative and Critical His-
tory of America, VI, Chap. I.

THE AMERICAN KEVOLUTIOK. 221

have gone on just tlie same, and witli the same final
result. For a long time both peoples had had a
common history ; but in the reaction at the Restora-
tion, the British race in England passed again under
the power of prerogative, exchanging it in 1688 for
the domination of a Parliament representing only
the rich and high-placed, — by no means the mass of
the nation. In Great Britain, therefore, the struggle
was to recover what had been lost. The emigrants
to New England, on the contrary, left behind insti-
tutions which were monarchical, both in Church and
State, and revived ancient institutions which were
democratic. They fought, therefore, to preserve
what had been retained, not to recover what had
been lost, and drew with them into the contest the
rest of America.

This view of the character of our Revolutionary
War is so unfamiliar that it is worth while to illus-
trate it with some fulness. As to the em- AMutyand
barrassments which the King and his ™American
ministers underwent from a powerful op- *<'™°^'^^-
position, in their attempts to coerce America, the
latest historian of the eighteenth century makes out
a strong case. From the first, the immense influence
of Pitt, soon to be Earl of Chatham, then the most
powerful of subjects, was on the side of America.
We have seen him justify, with all his eloquence,
the resistance to the Stamp Act, seconded by Lord
Camden, who also had great influence. At the time
of the tea duty, there was in Parliament a strong
section supporting the Americans, and outside of
Parliament a still more democratic party who kept
the country in alarm through fierce political agitation ;

222 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

all which, as was truly said by Lord North, lured on
America and blocked the efforts of the ministry.^
To be sure, the opposition were divided among them-
selves. Dean Tucker and Adam Smith favored let-
ting the colonies go.^ Burke and Chatham, on the
other hand, wished to retain them, but insisted upon
a repeal of all coercive and aggressive laws. Again,
Chatham always maintained that the American cause
was essentially that of the Whigs. No taxation with-
out representation " is the common cause of the
"Whigs on the other side of the Atlantic and on
this " ; he extolled the Americans as " Whigs in prin-
ciple and heroes in conduct," and openly wished
them success. Others of that party, however, like
Grenville, declared that the American cause was
anti-Whig,^ because, refusing the jurisdiction of Par-
liament, its supporters sought to extend the power of
the King. It must be admitted that some of the am-
munition of the American champions was drawn from
Tory arsenals, and this circumstance naturally tended
to alienate from them Whigs who were strict con-
Pear for Bng- structionists. The difference tended to
Amerirawere disappear as the contest proceeded: the
conquered. "W^higs generally became pro-American,
fearing that the conquest of those with whom they
sympathized in America would also establish absolu-
tism in England, — an opinion expressed by Chatham,
Fox, Horace Walpole, and Burke.*

Nor were the Whigs ever in full sympathy with
Position of ^^® Radicals. English Radicalism was born
Burke. jjj I'jQQ^ i^ ^Ijg tijj^g of ^.jjg Wilkes disturb-

1 Lecky : XVIIIth Century, III, pp. 403, 404. 2 Ibid., p. 421, etc.
8 Ibirl, p. 587. * Ibid., pp. 589, 590.

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 223

ances. Then began the agitation for parliamentary
reform, — a matter which the Wliigs took up but
slowly, differing among themselves. Burke, for in-
stance, though he taught the fundamental Whig doc-
trine, that Sovereign, Lords, and Commons must be
regarded as trustees of the people, and although he
advocated the publication of the discussions of Par-
liament and other advanced measures, was yet stub-
bornly against "levelling doctrines," opposing all
attempts to lower the suffrage, to abolish rotten bor-
oughs, to add to shire-representation, to modify in
any way the framework of Parliament. "The ma-
chine is well enough to answer any good purpose,
provided the materials were sound." And again :
" Our representation is as nearly perfect as the neces-
sary imperfection of human affairs and of human
creatures will suffer it to be." ^ As to parliamentary
reform, he was in opposition to the elder and the
younger Pitt, both of whom favored it, and he was
far away on many points from the " Society of the
Supporters of the Bill of Rights," who demanded
thorough government of, by, and for the people. In
opposing, as he did later in life, the French Revolu-
tion, he only carried out his earlier principles. The
Radicals had no friendship for him. Mr. Macaulay,
their ablest writer, said of his "Thoughts on the
Cause of the Present Discontents," that it contained
" a poison sufficient to destroy all the little virtue and
understanding of sound policy left in the nation;
and that it was peculiarly fitted to divert the nation
from organic and truly useful reforms to a revival of
aristocratic faction." ^

1 Leeky : XVIUth Century, III, p. 222. 2 Ibid., p. 224.

224 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

But for these dissensions in the opposition, the
King and his party, energetic though they were,
could scarcely have taken a step. The opposition
grew, to be very formidable in spite of the want of
union. Though the anti-American majority in Par-
liament in 1774 was heavy, the American cause was
powerfully upheld, and there was reason to believe
that if the masses were counted, England was for
the rebels. Common people held the war
pro-Ameri- in abhorrence. So, too, the manufacturers

can.

and traders : these often were actuated by
a selfish motive, for the war disturbed business ; and
yet it was mainly the demands of the commercial
class which had brought the war about. Non-con-
formists were steadily and zealously prcAmerican.
Dr. Price, a great light among them, expressed
American ideas in his " Essay on Liberty," and was
only restrained by ill-health from going to America
to manage the finances. In another sphere, the
tried and skilful soldiers, Amherst, Conway, and
Barre, did not conceal their sympathy. Fox eulo-
gized Montgomery, slain at Quebec, in the House of
Commons ; while the Duke of Richmond said in the
House of Lords, after Bunker Hill, that the Ameri-
cans were not in rebellion, but resisting acts of the
most unexampled cruelty and oppression. This re-
markable nobleman, who had gone in 1776 to France
to claim an old French peerage, wrote from Paris to
Burke, that the political condition of England was
one reason why he wished to claim the French peer-
age. He believed England to be on the verge of a
despotism more oppressive than that of France, for it
would be less tempered by habit and manners. He

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 225

Mmself was likely to be proscribed, and in that case,
"if America be not open to receive us, France is
some retreat, and a peerage here is something." i
The gleeful exclamation of Horace Walpole, in the
following year, over the surrender of Burgoyne, and
the declaration of his belief that the Americans were
better Englishmen than the English themselves, has
already been quoted.^ In the House of Commons,
the American army was spoken of as " our army."
William Pitt, in 1781, called the attempt to reduce
America, "most accursed, vricked, barbarous, cruel,
unnatural, diabolical." In the ruling class, a minor-
ity containing personages of the highest rank and the
ablest men in the nation had -identified itself com-
pletely with the insurgents. They resisted with pas-
sion ; for they came to feel — a feeling which modern
writers declared thoroughly justified — that the defeat
of the Americans would probably be followed by a
subversion of the constitution of England.^ Mean-
time, among the people, the war was to the last
degree unpopular. London was sometimes at the
mercy of mobs ; the army could be maintained only
by press-gangs, by emptying into the regiments the
prisons, and by buying Hessians.

If the King and his ministers were embarrassed by
an opposition, the American patriots were no less
embarrassed. An energetic minority, in , ,

° •' ' strength of

fact, brought to pass the Revolution, Toryism in

' o i America.

which proceeding especially from New
England, was carried through in spite of a majority

1 Burke's Correspondence, 11, pp. 112-120 ; in Lecky, III, p. 591.

" p. 110. ' Buckle : History of Civilization, I, p. 345, American ed.

226 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

in the colonies, — a majority in great part quite
apathetic, but to some extent actively resisting.^
Washington feared in 1776 that if his army were
unsuccessful, the enemy would recruit faster than the
patriots. The British governihent were sanguine as
to help from loyalists, and sent out at one time equip-
ments for eight thousand men, who, it was thought,
could easily be raised among its friends. Large
bodies in America were dragged into the war with
extreme reluctance. Many rich Southern planters
opposed; while the Pennsylvania Quakers were so
rscalcitrant as to draw upon themselves from stalwart
Samuel Adams, the " Father of the Revolution," the
charge of being "puling, pusillanimous cowards."
In New York, two-thirds of the property was in loy-
alist hands ; and, indeed, outside the city there was
no serious disaffection in the colony. Galloway, a
Tory active in the Congress of 1774, who afterwards
went to England, said before the House of Commons
that only one-fourth of the soldiers in arms were
really Americans. This, of course, was an exagger-
ation, but there is no doubt that ultimately recruits
to the " Continentals " were in great part recently
arrived Irish and Scotch immigrants. The Irish, in
particular, both Catholic and Protestant, sustained
the American cause, while many Scotch were Tories.^
In 1780, the force of the Revolution was so far spent,
and the opposition so powerful, that the patriot cause
was completely dependent upon France. The emi-
gration of Tories, when the day was at last won, was

1 Lecky : XVIIIth Century, III, p. 458, etc.

2 Ramsay : History of American Revolution, Appendix, No. IV. Dub-
Un, 1795.

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 227

relatively as great as that of the Huguenots after the
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The total num-
ber is estimated to have been at least one hundred
thousand.^ In this multitude were comprised only-
such, with their families, as had been active for the
King. The indifferent, who had lent no helping hand
to the patriots, must have been a multitude much
larger; these remained behind, inertly submitting to
the new order of things, as they had swayed inertly
this way or that, following the power and direction of
the blast of war.

Nor were the Tories only important because they
were numerous. They were generally of a character
that m^de their resistance most effective.^

__. T . 1 1 • 1 High position

"History, at this late date, can certainly and character
afford a compassionate word for the Tories,
who, besides having been forced to atone in life for
the mistake of taking the wrong side, by undergoing
exile and confiscation, have received while in their
graves little but detestation. At the evacuation
of Boston, says Mr. Sabine in the ' American
Loyalists,' eleven hundred loyalists retired to Nova
Scotia with the British army, of whom one hundred
and two were men in official station, eighteen were
clergymen, two hundred and thirteen were merchants
and traders of Boston, three hundred and eighty-two
were farmers and mechanics, in great part from the
country. The mere mention of calling and station
in the case of the forlorn, expatriated company con-
veys a suggestion of respectability. Just as numerous

1 Lecky : XVIIIth Century, IV, p. 285.

2 A passage here is taken from the writer's " Samuel Adams," Cliap.
XVIII, wliiclj see for a fuller consideration of the suhject.

228 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

and respectable were the exiles in the other colonies.
There were, in fact, no better men or women in
America, as regards intelligence, substantial good
purpose, and piety. They had made the one great
mistake of conceding a supremacy over themselves
to distant arbitrary masters, which a population
nurtured under the influence of the revived folk-
moot ought by no means to have made; but with
this exception, the exiles were not at all inferior
in worth of every kind to those who drove them
forth. The Tories were generally people of sub-
stance ; their stake in the coimtry was greater even
than that of their opponents ; their patriotism, no
doubt, was to the full as fervent. There is much
that is melancholy, of which the world knows but
little, connected with their expulsion from the land
they sincerely loved. The estates of the Tories
were among the fairest ; their stately mansions stood
on the sightliest hill-brows; the richest and best
tilled meadows were their farms; the long avenue,
the "broad lawn, the trim hedge about the garden,
servants, plate, pictures, — the varied circumstance,
external and internal, of dignified and generous
housekeeping, — for the most part these things were
at the homes of Tories. They loved beauty, dignity,
and refinement. It seemed to belong to such forms
of life to be generously loyal to King and Parlia-
ment, without questioning too narrowly as to rights
and taxes. The rude contacts of the town-meetings
were full of things to offend the taste of a gentle-
man. The Crown officials were courteous, well-born,
congenial, having behind them the far-away nobles
and the Sovereign, who rose in the imagination,

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 229

unknown and at a distance as they were, surrounded
by a brilliant glamour. Was there not a certain
meanness in haggling as to the tax which these
polite placemen and their superiors might choose to
exact, or inquiring narrowly as to their credentials
when they chose to exercise authority? The grace-
ful, the chivalrous, the poetic, the spirits over whom
these feelings had power, were sure to be Tories.
Democracy was something rough and coarse; inde-
pendence, — what was it but a severing of those
connections of which a colonist ought to be proudest !
It was an easy thing to be led into taking sides
against notions like these. Kence, when the country
rose, many a high-bred, honorable gentleman turned
the key in his door, drove down his liiie of trees with
his refined dame and carefully guarded children at
his side, turned his back on his handsome estate, and
put himself under the shelter of the proud banner of
St. George. It was a mere temporary refuge, he
thought, and as he pronounced upon ' Sam Adams '
and the rabble a gentlemanly execration, he promised
himself a speedy return, when discipline and loyalty
should have put down the ship-yard men and the
misled rustics.

" But the return was never to be. The day went
against them; they crowded into ships with the
gates of their country barred forever be- pathetic cir-
hind them. They found themselves penni- "? th*etr°elpa.
less upon shores often bleak and barren, '"»«™-
always showing scant hospitality to outcasts who
came empty-handed, and there they were forced to
begin life anew. Having chosen their side, their
lot was inevitable. Nor are the victors to be harshly

230 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

judged. There was no unnecessary cruelty shown
to the loyalists. The land they had left belonged
to the new order of things, and, good men and
women though they were, there was nothing for
them, and justly so, but to bear their expatriation
and poverty with such fortitude as they could find.
Gray, Clarke, Erving, and Faneuil, Royall and
Vassall, Fayerweather and Leonard and Sewall,
families of honorable note, bound in with all that
was best in the life of the Province, who now can
think of their destiny without pity ? "

The war of the American Revolution, then, was a
strife not of countries, but of parties, — a strife carried
Victory of the on both in England and in America, —

popular party ° '

of the'ltiar bloodless iu the mother-land, bloody in the
»'=• dependency, — but, nevertheless, a strife

carried on in each arena for the preservation of the
same priceless treasure, — Anglo-Saxon freedom, —
and fought through with similar spirit. On one side
of the Atlantic, victory came speedily. In America
there were no traditions and institutions, rooted for
centuries, to be upturned; and besides, there came
most timely help from France. We are to see, how-
ever, how victory in America drew necessarily with
it victory in England. It has long been delayed, but
it has been steadily coming, until at the present
moment, as regards popular freedom, the two coun-
tries stand nearly together, — England, perhaps,
though preserving monarchical forms, and much
social feudalism, really in advance. Popular free-
dom was probably saved to England by the success

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 231

of the American struggle ; ^ and, on the other hand,
America has derived that popular freedom nowhere
but from the mother-land, through the struggles of
her Alfred, of her Langton and the Barons of 1215,
of her Earl Simon, of her knights-of-the-shire, her
Ironsides, her supporters of the Bill of Rights.
What a noble community is this, — common striv-
ing so heroic for a common cause of such supreme
moment ! How mean the nursing of petty prejudice
between lands so linked ; how powerful the motive
to join hand with hand and heart with heart !

I Lecky : XVIIIth Century, III, p. 289 ; see also Buckle, as before
cited, p. 225.

232 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER XV.

THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES.

1783-1789.

When the war of the American Revolution had
been brought to a successful issue, and the Thirteen
The written Colonies stood independent, as United
unique fii™* Statcs, the momeutous question at once
American was presented, What shall be the form of
polity. ^]^g ^g^ nation? The adoption of the

Federal Constitution was the next step taken. The
only unique feature of the American polity, as the
new nation took shape, was the proAdsion as regards
each separate State and as regards the United States,
for a carefully formulated instrument, to be drawn
up by an assembly of representatives of the people
distinct from the legislative assembly, — an instru-
ment to be interpreted by a Supreme Court especially
empowered for that purpose, — an instrument, by
which the whole work of law-making shall be imper-
atively controlled. No such controlling instrument
In England, ^^ guidcd the development of Great
fomplSy Britain, or of any other land. De Tocque-
unfettered. ^^^^ declared that in Great Britain the
constitution can change without cessation, or rather
it does not exist. The English law-makers are com-
pletely unfettered. English writers, such as Black-

CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 233

stone, and his ablest commentator Chi-istian, ^ make
similar statements. In a former time, indeed, one
may find in law-writers the idea that there are
fundamental principles superior to Kings and Par-
liaments ; but the modern doctfine is that of the ab-
solute supremacy of Parliament. Jeremy Bentham
proclaimed that nothing was superior to legislation,
and that is the theory of to-day. The "Written,"
or as Mr. Bryce calls it, the " Rigid," Constitution,
as part of the polity of a people, appears for the first
time in America. It is the most distinctive feature
of our system, and, moreover, that probably which
has the most value.

"We have not yet," says Dr. W. G. Hammond,
"fully learned the vast importance and momentous
consequences of the new. element that has
been introduced into the science of govern- the written

- Constitution.

ment by . . . the recognition of two dis-
tinct and unequal grades of law (even though both
derive their authority from the same supreme power,
the people), one of which always controls and limits
the other, and cannot be changed or limited by it or
by any other of the ordinary processes of legislation ;
and consequent upon this the securing of the funda-
mental maxims of the government and its main feat-
ures, against attacks of the persons in authority,
while they are yet endowed with the powers neces-
sary for the conduct of affairs."^ The Fathers put
as many obstacles as they could contrive, as Lowell
phrases it, " not in the way of the people's will, but
of their whim " ; above all is the Rigid Constitution,
a bridle upon popular whim. By this the people
1 Commentaries, I, p. 91. ^ Western Jurist, April, 1869, p, 6S, etc.

234 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

have shorn themselves of a measure of their power,
making themselves safe from themselves, and thus is
imparted to the government the highest practicable
and desirable stability.

Although in its developed form the idea of a Rigid
Constitution does not appear until the establishment
History of the ^^ America, the beginnings of the notion
"*'*■ must be sought for earlier. A germ of

the idea may possibly be found in Magna Charta ;
still another, in the charters by which the guilds of
the Middle Ages were constituted.^ Each corpora-
tion found its grant of privileges accompanied by a
code of obligations, to which it was forced to conform
under penalty of losing those privileges. The Eng-
lish settlement of America was made by great trading
corporations, the charters of which, originally nothing
more than grants to mercantile companies, made in
true mediaeval fashion, when "perverted" into in-
struments of government, stood behind the colonial
assemblies, like the constitutions behind the legisla-
tures, State and Federal, of the American Union.

It is, however, in the idea of an American Consti-
tution that it shall come from the people themselves.
It must come ^^° ^^® *° ^^ bound by it. In the case of
pie'them- ^^°' ^^^ charters mentioned, some outside au-
seives. thority. King, or over-lord of lower rank,

imposes the limitation. Whence comes this noble
element of self-restriction ? In the Social Compact on
board the "Mayflower" ; the agreement of the Rhode
Island settlers in 16S7 ; and of the Connecticut towns,
Hartford, _Wethersfield, and Windsor, a year or two
later, the freemen bind themselves. In the time of

1 Brooks Adams : Atlantic Monthly, November, 1884.

CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 235

the English Commonwealth, Vane in the " Healing
Question," in 1656, clearly outlines what has become
the American form of a constitutional convention,
and urges Cromwell to call one for the settlement of
the " fundamentals," instead of pursuing an arbitrary-
course. Cromwell took no notice of Vane's sugges-
tion; though the idea was in the minds of men, no
great people undertook to put it in practice until after
another century had passed. When at the throw-
ing off of the royal dominion, the charters under
which the Thirteen Colonies had existed lost author-
ity, the people in the several States made provision
for the new order of things, continuing generally the
old charters with little change, as the most convenient
scheme that could be devised. When, therefore, in
1787, the fathers gathered in convention at Philadel-
phia for their memorable work, sent by the will of the
people, the proceeding was not without precedent,
though the scale on which the experiment was to be
made was larger than ever before.

Though the idea of formulating for a new State
a Rigid Constitution by means of a .convention of
popular delegates was something novel,
there was, as regards the Constitution t'on "f Bng-

^ ^ lish forma by

itself,^ when it at last appeared, singularly Convention of
little that was original. " The Fathers,"
says Bryce,^ "had neither the rashness nor the
capacity necessary for constructing a constitution a
priori : there is wonderfully little genuine inventive-
ness in the world, least of all in the field of political
institutions. They followed methods which experi-

1 A summary of the Federal Constitution is given in Appendix D.
3 American Commonwealth, VoJ. I, p. 31, American ed.

236 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ence had tested, — their own colonial governments,
of late transformed into State governments." These
had a general resemblance to the British constitution,
and in so far, it may with truth be said that the
British constitution became the model for the new
national government. The claim made by Sir Henry
Maine ^ is not at all extravagant, that the Constitution
of the United States is colored throughout by ideas
of British origin ; is, in fact, a version of the British
constitution as it must have presented itself to an
Contrast be- obscrvcr iu the second half of the last cen-
tutioS-maTers ^^^J- ^ most significant contrast is to be
in^^le™" noticed between the work of the constitu-
'''"'"■ tion-makers of the incipient United States,

and that of the constitution-makers of other countries,
both in Europe and America, which within a hundred
years have undertaken a reconstruction of their re-
spective governments. In the case of the latter, the
re-shaping has generally been done in a temper of
bitter dissatisfaction with the old institutions, and
with an earnest determination to build anew from the
foundation, cutting loose completely from the past.
So it has been in Mexico and the South American
Eepublics, founded upon the ancient dependencies of
Spain ; so it has been in the case of Spain herself ; so,
to a most marked degree, it has been in the case of
France. In the United States, however, the people at
the outset were more than satisfied with the bulk of
their institutions, and adopted them without change,
for the new order. " All sorts of old English institu-
tions," says Bryce, " have been transferred bodily, and
sometimes look as odd in the midst of their new sur-

1 fopular Government, Essay IV, Constitution of the United States,

CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 237

roundings as the quaint gables of a seventeenth cen-
tury house among the terraces of a growing London
suburb." ^

As to local divisions and administration, everything
went forward in the different parts of the country
without break. The towns of New Eng-

1 J J 1 T. -J. i i- Local forms

land, governed each by its town-meeting, quite un-

.. .". 1 J. changed.

a resuscitation, as we have seen, of a very
ancient order, persisted in full vigor. In the South,
the parishes, each governed by its vestry, and pos-
sessing a civil as well as ecclesiastical jurisdiction,
all carefully modelled after the English parish of the
seventeenth century, were continued without inter-
ruption. — As to county government, its centre con-
tinued to be the County Court. Justices, sheriff,
constable, coroner, — the functionaries, continued un-
der the old names : the forms of procedure underwent
no alteration ; the traditions persisted, even to the old
French " Oyez, oyez ! " with which the crier called
the court to order. As to the retention of this
scheme of local government, the decision, of course,
rested with the States, each choosing for itself. Each,
without exception, clung to the English heirlooms,
attempting no innovation. Louisiana, entering the
Union at a later day, preferred to retain the French
organization to which she was accustomed ; but with
the single exception of Louisiana, every one of the
forty-four States now contained within the United
States, — the original Thirteen as well as the Dako-
tas, Washington, Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming,
the communities added but now, — are in their
polities from top to bottom English, each inheriting

1 American Gonuuonwealth, I, p. 180.

238 AKGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the priceless treasure of the English common law,
each in all the details of administration inheriting
English forms, traditions, and nomenclature.

As regards the Federal Constitution, the following
of English precedents is just as apparent as in the
case of the forms of local self-government. When
the Federal Constitution was formulated and sent
out to the States to be ratified, the exasperation
against England was extreme, and the friends of the
measure in recommending it were as reticent as pos-
sible as to their obligation to the mother-country.
The papers of the "Federalist," for instance, are
marked by this reticence. With only one or two ex-
ceptions, however, the features of the federal scheme
are distinctly English.^ The resemblance

The President „ , t, . , ■, t. ■ . ■, -rr- n i

the English of the r residcut to the British King of the

King of the . °

eighteenth end of the eighteenth centurv is obvious.

century. ^ "^

Each possesses the executive power, com-
mands the army and navy, makes treaties, appoints
ambassadors and judges, — -all with the advice and
consent of the Upper House of the legislature ; each
has a qualified veto on legislation, and the power
of convening the legislature in extra session. It
is probable that the constitution-makers constructed
their chief magistrate simply by reviewing the pow-
ers of the King and modif3dng them where they
appeared excessive or unsuitable. At an earlier and
at a later time, the British Sovereign was some-
thing very different; but the only essential distinc-
tions between the powers of the Presidency and of
the Kingship, as it was under George III, are that
the Presidency is not hereditary, and can be held

1 Sir Henry Maine : Popular Government, p. 211, etc.

CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 239

(without re-election) for only a short term. At
present, the President has much more power than
the English Sovereign; much more, too, than was
possessed by the first Hanoverians; much less than
was possessed by the Tudors ; than was claimed,
though unsuccessfully, by the Stuarts. As to the
method of electing the President, we have the most
important departure from English precedents which
the Federal Constitution-makers allowed themselves.
In the old day when Anglo-Saxon freedom

• ■ T T -TT- Tl"^ Electoral

remained unimpaired, the Kinsr was elected coiiege bor-

, ° rowed from

by the people in the great folk-moot, and '^e Hoiy eo-

•' r r o ^ nj^ji Empire.

in a later time by the witan, in the pres-
ence and with the consent of the people, whose
acclamations, as we have seen, were craved at coro-
nations, during many centuries, as an essential part
of the ceremony : in America, however, a selected
body was provided for, the Electoral College, which,
though itself proceeding from the people, was to take
the election out of the hands of the people, that the
choice might be made by a small circle especially
enlightened. This feature of the Constitution was
borrowed from the Holy Roman Empire, in which a
small body of Kurfursten met to determine upon the
supreme magistrate. The Electoral College is the
most conspicuous failure of the Constitution. The
precedent upon which it was based was also a failure.
Both in Germany and America, the failure proceeded
from the same cause : the electors fell, in Germany,
under the control of the dominant factions of the
French or Austrian party, — as in America, they fall
under the control of the Republican or Democratic
party.

240 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

As to the legislature, the bi-cameral feature,

the two Houses, bears the plain mark of a British

original. In old France, there were three

Commons bodies ; so in Spain. In Sweden, there

suggests the

House of Eep- were four estates. The House of Repre-

resentatives.

sentatives is unquestionably a reproduction
of the British House of Commons of one hundred
years ago, though the two bodies exhibit at present
in some points a wide divergence. Each is consti-
tuted of members elected by a popular franchise ;
each has the power of originating all money-bills ; a
century ago, the House of Commons, like the House
of Representatives, was restricted to legislative func-
tions, and had no voice in the appointment of the
Cabinet. The present far-i'eaching and constant
interference with the executive through the interro-
gation of ministers, is a recent acquisition of power ;
while the right of the Commons to designate Cabinet
ministers, at present thoroughly established, was suc-
Anaiogybe. ccssfuUy disputcd by George III. The
oTLmSTad analogy between the Upper Houses of the
Senate. English and American Legislatures is

much less marked than in the case of the Lower
Houses. The complete absence in America of a
class of nobles, compelled the Constitution-makers to
look elsewhere for the means of forming an Upper
Chamber. Following at last the suggestion of Con-
necticut, they hit upon the happy expedient of mak-
ing the Upper House " reflect the original political
equality of the several states."^ Without regard
to amount of territory, wealth, or population, it was
ordained that each State should send two members to

1 Maine : Popular Government, p. 229.

CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 241

the Senate. The adoption of this provision in 1787,
not only made possible the acceptance of the Consti-
tution, but has proved since one of the best strokes
in the memorable work that was then done. While
in a general way acting like the House of Lords, to
restrain and supplement the work of the Lower House,
the Senate has executive functions, also, which, as
time has passed, have developed into greater im-
portance. From the outset it has possessed such a
dignity of character, and its action has been attended
in every stage of our history with consequences so
salutary, that it must be regarded as one. of the
most fortunate creations of the Fathers.

The Supreme Court, finally, which in the Federal
Constitution represents the judicial function, as the
President represents the executive, and
Congress the legislative, has been held by tothe su!
De Tocqueville and other writers to be ^'°™^
a brilliant American invention. Sir Henry Maine
regards it as something unique,^ but finds in its
make-up and in its forms of procedure, marks of
English originals. Bryce goes still farther, claiming
that it is throughout based on English precedents.
The British judges, irremovable except by impeach-
ment, are its model. It can act only indirectly, in
special cases in which the United States, States, and
individuals are parties ; a declaration of unconstitu-
tionality not provoked by a definite dispute is un-
known to the Supreme Court. " Much that is really
English appears to De Tocqueville to be American
or democratic. The function of the judges, for
instance, in expounding the Constitution and dis-

1 Maine : Popular Government, p. 217, etc.

242 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

regarding a statute which conflicts therewith, . . .
is a mere instance of a general doctrine of Eng-
lish law adapted to states partially subordinate to
a federal government." ^ No authority weighed
so much with the Constitution-makers of 1787 as
Montesquieu, as appears from the frequency and the
irfluenceof revereucc with which the "Esprit des
??Eaprifdes"'° Lois" is cited in the "Federalist." Special
"'^^ weight is given to his assertion of the

essential separation in a proper polity, of the legis-
lative, judicial, and executive powers. The distinc-
tion has become now a commonplace of politics, but
it was recognized only slowly. The different nature
of the legislative and executive functions was not
appreciated until the fourteenth century; and that
the judicial stood apart from both was a discovery
of the eighteenth. " There is no liberty," declared
Montesquieu, " if the judicial power be not separated
from the legislative and executive " ; and in this
declaration we find the source, no doubt, of the
Federal judicature in the Federal Constitution.^
Neither the Supreme Court, nor in fact the Federal
Constitution in general, would have been likely to
come about had not the " Esprit des Lois " been
written. But the great French thinker was led to
his views while contrasting admiringly the institu-
tions of England with those of his native land ; ^ and

1 Bryce: Johns Hopkins University Studies, 5th Series, IX, p. 26.

2 Maine : Popular Government, p. 220.

8 In the English constitution, as now developed, the legislative, exec-
utive, and judicial functions are by no means separated as Montesquieu
conceived they were in his day. " The efficient secret of the English
constitution is the close union, the nearly complete fusion, of the ex-
ecutive and legislative powers. The connecting link is the Cabinet."
— Bagehot ; English Constitution, pp. 2 and 10.

CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 243

in adopting his thought, the founders of America had
ready to their hands English constructions which
needed only to be transferred.

The Constitution of the United States, then, is
by no means a new political departure, but merely a
modified version of what stood in England between
1760 and 1787. Circumstances excluded an heredi-
tary King and nobility, and the variations to be noted
are chiefly due to this exclusion. As in the local gov-
ernment of town, parish, county, and State, almost no
change is made, the citizen administering forms into
which he was born and for the working of which he
has an hereditary aptitude handed down through
many centuries ; so as regards the Federal instru-
ment, nearly all is old. The stability of America is,
no doubt, owing to the great portion of England
which is thus embedded in it, though the sagacity
must be admired with which the founders filled up
the interstices left by the inapplicability of certain of
the then existing English institutions, to the eman-
cipated colonies.^ What was excluded, in fact, was
that in the English polity which made against the
Anglo-Saxon freedom, the absolutism and privilege
which had come to pass in later times because the
powerful were determined to encroach, and the people
were negligent in maintaining their birthright. When
all was done, and the great growing nation had had
time to accommodate itself to its political garment, it
was found that it was government of, by, and for the
people which had been provided for. Though noth-
ing important, either in State or Federal Constitution

1 Maine : Popular Government, p. 253.

244 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

was new or un-English, something important had been
sloughed off. Moreover, it is an innovation that there
must be for State and for Union, the Constitution,
the rigid, carefully formulated instrument by which
legislature, executive, and judiciary are to be care-
fully bound ; not to be amended but by a process of
some difficulty, — in the case of the Federal instru-
ment so difficult as to be seldom practicable. It has
„ acted for America, says Sir Henry Maine,

Sir Henry ■• J J '

Maine'a admi- " like the dikes and dams which strike the

ration of the

Federal Con- eye of the traveller along the Rhine, con-
stitution, ^ ^ . .

trolling the course of a river which begins
amid mountain torrents, turning it into one of the
most equable waterways in the world." ^ It was this
restored Anglo-Saxon freedom, so similar to that of
the plains of the Weser and Elbe two thousand years
ago, in all its main outlines, however its adaptation to
a higher civilization and a vastly larger nation may
have caused development, — sovereignty of the plain
people, safeguarded and carefully ordered as long
experience advised, — which one hundred years ago,
April 30, 1789, Washington, as Chief Magistrate,
made oath to administer.

1 Popular Government, p. 245.

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 245

CHAPTER ■ XVI.

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE, AND THE REEORM BILL
OE 1832.

6«orge IV, 1820. WiUiam IV, 1830. Victoria, 183T.

With tlie loss of the thirteen American colonies,
the greatness of England seemed quite destroyed.
Far-seeing statesmen of her rival, France, French antici-
had sought comfort at the time when Que- fand°" ?uin°!"
bee fell before Wolfe, in the anticipation J^| ImeriLn
that the colonies, freed now from fear of k«™1""°°-
a hostile power always ready to descend upon them
from Canada, no longer needing protection, would
soon throw off the dependence by which protection
had been accompanied. The anticipation was well
based : the spirit of independence at once appeared,
as Choiseul, Argenson, Kalm, and other foreign observ-
ers had believed it would. France fanned the dis-
content; when the disputants came to blows, she
gladly lent America money and men ; when at York-
town the British army surrendered and American
independence became certain, France thought her
revenge complete, and saw nothing in the future but
her own undisputed supremacy in the civilized world.

The ill-wishers of England saw far, but not far
enough. The independence of America crippled the
island kingdom for a moment only : at the How they

■' . were frua-

same time it established the supremacy m trated.

246 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the world of the Englisji tongue, of English free-
dom, of English ideas in general, — a supremacy
before which France was destined to sink irrecover-
ably. Since the establishment of the United States,
the life of the English-speaking race has had two
currents instead of one : the older has not lessened,
while the newer current has flowed with a force
which has changed the face of the world.^ With the
adoption of the Federal Constitution, America began
her separate course. Within thirty years England
had acquired a new colonial empire vaster even than
the one she had possessed at first. Taught by expe-
rience, she has managed these newer dependencies
with wisdom: the connection which the Thirteen
Colonies rejected, the new empire has carefully and
affectionately cherished.

Not all of America became independent with the
United States. Canada, lately conquered, containing
Why Canada ^ populatiou of sixty thousaud French,
fheUn'ited" remained to England. Between Canada
States. g^jjjj ^jjg Thirteen Colonies had existed a

fierce hereditary feud. In religion, as Catholics and
Protestants, they were utterly antagonistic ; for a
hundred and fifty years, since the occupation of
America by French and English, in fact, the wars
between them had been almost continuous. The
Canadians might hate England, but they hated her
late dependencies still more. During the war of the
Revolution, American invasions of Canada met with
no support from the Tiabitans ; and since the British
fleet could easily pour troops into the country and
command from the St. Lawrence all the most im-

i J. R. Green : History of the English People, IV, p. 270.

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 247

portant points, such invasions were easily frustrated.
At once after the close of the war, we have seen a
cause become operative which greatly increased
Canadian dislike. The expatriated Tories, to the
number of many thousands, sought homes in Canada.
The ideas they rejected had triumphed; through
wholesale confiscation they had been stripped of all
they possessed ; the spots they loved had been barred
to them. Deep resentment on their part was inevit-
able, — resentment which their descendants have not
ceased to feel down to the present hour.

At the very time when the over-severe grasp of the
mother-country upon America was being beaten off,
the greatest of English sailors was lifting voyages of
the curtain in the South Pacific behind Captain cook.
which lay concealed an immense new world. James
Cook, in the "Endeavour," and the "Resolution,"
entering seas which, indeed, had been penetrated be-
fore by Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch, but of which
almost nothing was known, brought to the attention
of civilized men the existence of vast habitable lands.
He mapped out accurately the two contiguous islands
of New Zealand, nearly as large as Italy, possessed of
a climate most favorable to Anglo-Saxon men, and of
the richest natural resources of every kind. Coast-
ing at great peril through the intricate barrier-reefs,
along the far-extending shore, from Van Diemen's
Land to the northern cape of what is now Queens-
land, he traced the position and shape of a new con-
tinent, a land of the finest promise. How memorable
the change these regions were to experience during
the hundred years that followed ! Scarcely was the
work of Cook accomplished when the Cape of Good

248 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Hope fell to England out of the weakening grasp of
the Dutch. Her empire of India, which the French
had disputed, was a matter of no doubt after the ruin
of Dupleix. Rodney's defeat of De Grasse gave her
at the same time the West Indies. Points of foot-
hold in long series were made firm in the sea, —
Gibraltar, Malta, Aden, Singapore, Hong Kong, Van-
couver, Bermuda, Ascension, the Falkland Isles, —
stepping-stones over which England might proceed
with speed and unobstructed, to succor or comfort
her vast outlying dominions. It was not until the
loss of the Thirteen Colonies, which seemed at the
time so immense, so decisive of her decline, that, in
the period of Webster, she became " that power
whose morning drum-beat, following the sun and
keeping company with the hours, fills the whole earth
with one continuous and unbroken strain of the
martial airs of England."

Studying the extraordinary expansion of the influ-
ence of England with reference to the spread in the
DiBtinctionB world of Auglo-Saxou freedom, we must,
*amon"?he it is plain, make a distinction among the
pendenofesof territories which form her great outlying
BaftlSdWe'Bl empire. In India, for instance, she appears
simply as a ruler. Two hundred and fifty
millions own her sway, which is exercised by only a
few thousand Englishmen, the civil officials and the
regiments which form the nucleus of the army. The
vast mass of the population live on, little touched by
the ideas of the masters, — preserving their own relig-
ious ideas for the most part, preserving the ancient
structure of society based upon caste ; preserving
in the whole internal administration of affairs, the

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 249

political forms to which they have been accustomed.
However much European civilization may have
reached a few individuals among classes fortunately
placed, the multitude know it not ; as to the foreign
lordship, they are only aware that they can follow
their ancient ways with a peace which was utterly
strange to the land while under Asiatic rule. Again,
as to the West Indies, the Anglo-Saxon population,
never large, steadily diminishes ; while a multitude
of blacks, descendants of the slaves brought from
Africa, a race yielding only slowly, and under very
favorable conditions, to the higher social forms,
spreads constantly wider, threatening the islands
with a reign of barbarism.

In quite a different class from the East and West
Indies must be placed Canada, South Africa, New
Zealand, and Australia. Each of these

. I. , , • Canada, South

names stands tor a arroup oi great tern- Africa, aus-

- tralasla.

tories in all of which the native races are
disappearing more or less rapidly ; in all of which a
large Anglo-Saxon population is firmly rooted, with
all the appliances of the highest European civiliza-
tion ; in none of which has there prevailed the curse
of an importation of an enslaved barbaric race. To
what an extent these new lands have adopted Anglo-
Saxon freedom, and how vast their influence has been
and is likely to be with reference to it, will be best
understood if we look first at a closely related change
in the motherland, — a change which followed and to
a large extent depended upon the loss of the Thir-
teen Colonies, — the enfranchisement of the plain
people, namely; for this was the deep fundamental
cause of benefits incalculable.

250 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Even before the close of the American war, clear
symptoms were not wanting of a great change in the
Pitt's a ta- condition of England. In 1782, Pitt moved
mentMy''"^"* in the Housc of Commons for an inquiry
reform. ^^^q parliamentary representation, looking

toward a radical reform of its abuses ; and in this he
was supported by members of great eminence, by
some, indeed, who usually stood in opposition to him,
like Charles James Fox. Pitt's proposition came
very near prevailing; a majority of only twenty
rejected it. Pitt brought forward his scheme again
in the following year, when its popularity seemed not
diminished. WhUe Parliament was on the point of
taking a momentous step, the aroused nation, pressing
vigorously for a more satisfactory representation, was
in a ferment. Especially noticeable was the action
of a great society, known as the Friends

The Friends n , -r, i . . p ,

ofthePeo- 01 the People, ansmg out or the society
of the Supporters of the Bill of Rights,
which had become famous in the time of Wilkes.
The Friends of the People stimulated in various ways
the desire for a better political condition, working
with especial effect by means of the distribution of
facts and figures which gave startling illustration
of existing abuses.

But while all signs promised an immediate reform,
the attention of England was suddenly diverted else-
where; the disposition to change underwent a sud-
den cooling; the transformation of England into a
freer and better ordered state was postponed for an
entire generation. What arrested the operation of
causes that had shown such activity was the Blench
Revolution. In its earlier stages, it had been by no

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 251

means without sympathy in other lands than France ;

the leaven spread abroad by Rousseau and

his followers had been working, indeed, pathy with the

" French Revo-

throughout the civilized world. Even lutiouinits

^° ^ ^ earlier stages.

Russia had been touched by the influence,
where Catherine II meditated certain ameliorations
of the condition of her subjects, to some extent in
accord with the humane striving of Joseph II in
Germany, with that of Pombal in Portugal, even
vdth the effort of the founders of America, w'ho in a
spirit not altogether democratic, it must be remem-
bered, had laid the basis of a great state across the
sea. England was by no means cold to the new ideas :
her thinkers to someextent echoed them; her younger
poets, Wordsworth, Southey, Coleridge, were ablaze
with the generous fire ; the people recognized in the
upspringing freedom across the Channel something
akin to what they desired; and the liberal leaders
welcomed the spread of thoughts so likely to promote
the generous measures they themselves had at heart.
All, however, was transitory. The morning that
had dawned so fair speedily became over- ueaction on
cast : the excesses of the Reign of Terror Re°gn°of°Te?.^
frightened into silence the voices that had "''■
been advocating liberty. Prerogative, privilege, —
absolutism in the ruler's chair, the assumptions of a
preferred class, — in every land in Europe the hold
upon the world of these hoary abuses, which just be-
fore had seemed to be so thoroughly shaken, became
suddenly confirmed. The nations, become reaction-
ary, banded themselves against France, where liberty
had passed into license ; and in the forefront of the
Allies, with Burke lamenting eloquently the fall of

252 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the dynasty of Hugh Capet, and thundering fiercely
against the democracy that had destroyed it, — with
Pitt suppressing his popular sympathies, and rousing
into life and ranging for battle all the ancient aristo-
cratic forces, — appeared no other than England. For
a time the voices that spoke for the rights of the peo-
ple were quite silenced. Dukes and viscounts led
armies and fleets ; Parliament, made up of a reinvig-
orated House of Lords, and of a House of Commons
sent by rotten boroughs and by shires bought up by
moneyed and titled magnates, sanctioned and sup-
ported. The mass of men meanwhile, reaping much
gain from crops and manufactures because embargoes
shut out foreign competition and the waste of war-
fare caused an unnatui'al demand, shuddered at what
they heard of the work of the guillotine, paid their
taxes, sent their sons into ranks and on to decks which
the French cannon forever swept bare of men, and
suffered their aspirations after a better order thor-
oughly to cool.

A change, however, came. Waterloo brought

peace, and also a time of reckoning. The morbid

prosperity of the years of war was fol-

CessatiOD of^ _-,, ^ ^ ^.

the reactiou at lowcd by debt and deep distress. The

"Waterloo.

Holy Alliance proceeded to fix upon Eu-
rope a chain of tyranny quite intolerable. In the
House of Commons of 1816 the very bottom of abuse
was touched. Of the 658 members but 171 could by
any stretch of construction be regarded as popular
representatives ; while the members who were noth-
ing more than nominees of the government and of
private patrons numbered 487. The private patrons,
again, counted but 267, of whom 144 were members

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIKE. 253

of tlie House of Lords. ^ It was the hour of special
darkness just before day. The spirit of Agitation for
change was again in the air, becoming '"'°™-
more pervasive and imperative with each year that
passed, until a temper prevailed which the forces of
privilege could no longer resist. In March of the
year 1831 came the memorable introduction by Lord
John Russell of the first Reform Bill.^ Heaps of
petitions lay on the table, the venerable hall of St.
Stephen's was crowded, dense masses of people stood
outside waiting for the news, and beyond them were
horsemen ready to carry the first information of the de-
tails of the bill to every part of England. The chief
evils demanding remedy were : 1. The existence of
rotten boroughs, places with few electors, sometimes,
indeed, with no inhabitants at all, which returned
members to. Parliament. 2. The fact that large
towns, which had grown into importance through
commerce, were left without representation. 3. The
unequal distribution of the franchise itself, so that
only a small part of the population had the right of
voting in elections. The bill proposed that sixty
of the smaller boroughs should be disfranchised alto-
gether; that forty -seven should return only one
member, instead of two ; on the other hand, London
was to receive eight additional representatives, and
thirty-four seats were to be distributed among a
number of towns heretofore unrepresented. The
English counties had allotted to them fifty-five new
members ; the Scotch, five ; the Irish, three ; the

1 Hannis Taylor : Origin and Growth of the English Constitution,
I, p. 613.

2 Oscar Browning: Modern England, in Epochs of History Series,
pp. 18, 19.

254 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Welsh, one. These changes would reduce the House
of Commons from 658 to 596. Corporations in bor-
oughs lost the exclusive right of election, which was
uniformly extended to all householders who paid
^10 a year rent. These changes gave votes to half
a million citizens who were before without them.
The body of the people supported the bill, while the
court, the Church, the army and navy, the lawyers,
the universities, the nobility and gentry, were gener-
ally against it. The Tories said its passage would
be a revolution; the Radicals would have preferred
something nearer universal suffrage. The bill was
lost, and Parliament was dissolved in April.

In a few weeks a new Parliament was elected. In
the elections, in the midst of great excitement,
reformers were chosen generally throughout the
country. The second Reform Bill, introduced by
Lord John Russell in July, was different in no im-
portant point from the first ; it passed the House of
Commons in September, by a majority of 106. Earl
Grey, the head of the ministry, whose name is most
honorably identified with the cause of reform, intro-
duced it in the House of Lords, but it was rejected
by a majority of forty-one. A revolution seemed
imminent. A cry was raised for the abolition of the
House of Lords. Peers were attacked in the streets ;
sixty thousand men in procession presented a petition
to the King. Riots prevailed. The Church shared with
the aristocracy the hatred of the people. Parliament,
after prorogation, met again in December,

Passage of the r 6 ' 6

Eeform Bill and the third Reform Bill was introduced,

of 1832.

little changed from its predecessors. It
passed the Commons, March, 1832. The Lords, as

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 255

before, blocked the path, bringing upon their heads a
fierce storm of popular disapproval, in the midst of
which permission was given by the King to Earl
Grey and Lord Brougham, the heads of the ministry,
to create such a number of Peers out of men friendly
to the measure, as would be necessary to pass the
bill. Before such danger the Lords recoiled. The
bill passed in June, only twenty-two Lords opposing;
William IV refused to sign in person, and a commis-
sion was appointed for the purpose. The momen-
tous struggle was over; it was apparent that there
was no power in the State which could resist the
House of Commons when it had become once fixed
upon its course.

The reform, so great that it ought rather to be
called a revolution, at once justified itself. A spirit
of moderation was shown in the elections. Q^g^ effects
The new Parliament, really representative oftSe&efo''rm
for the first time since Cromwell, was ^'"'
guilty of no follies, but forthwith remedied evils of
whose abatement there had been under the old order
no hope. In England and Ireland the pressiire
exercised by the established Church was greatly
lightened, slavery was presently abolished in the
dependencies, cheap postage was introduced, a begin-
ning made in alleviating the hardships of factory life,
and a grant allowed for education. It soon became
apparent that a deep-seated brutality, which long had
marked the mass of the people, was largely due to
the denial from which they had suffered, of political
rights. The exercise of the new privileges had a
most wholesome effect in educating those who now
possessed them ; the pressure of public responsibility

256 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

evoked manliood in those who were subjected to it.
These results, which no reasonable observer could fail
to remark, prepared the way for still another instal-
ment of popular liberty. The reform of 1832 had been
only partial. In thirty years the demand became strong
for something more ; as before, years of agitation, less
violent, however, than at first, preceded action. In
1867, the franchise was put into the hands of new mil-
lions ; and in 1884, by the admission of the agricul-
tural laborers, it was still further extended. Scotland
and Ireland were placed upon the same footing; a
re-arrangement and equalization of the constituencies
took place upon the most equitable principles ; and it
became possible to describe England as transformed
„ , , into "a republic, in which, under the

EDgland prac- ^ ■*- ^

tieaiiyare- ancient and still useful forms of the

public.

throne and the regalia, the People is
King " ; ^ a state wliich has far more in common with
the ancient time, when Anglo-Saxon freedom was
fully alive, than with the intervening ages when
Anglo-Saxon freedom was suppressed.^

At the present hour no power in England can
stand against the House of Commons, which has
Power of the l^ecome as thoroughly representative of
Cabinet. -f^j-^g peoplc as was ever the folk-moot of

the tribes in distant antiquity. Montesquieu praised
the separation of the legislative, the executive, and
the judicial power, which he thought he could see in

1 H. Taylor : Origin and Growth of the English Constitution, I, p. 166.
"The appendages of a monarchy have been converted into the essence
of a republic. ... It is only a disguised republic which is suited to
such a being as the Englishman, in such a century as the nineteenth."
Bagehot : English Constitution, pp. 285-291.

2 Freeman : Growth of English Constitution, p. 158.

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 257

the Englisli polity of his time ; and the makers of
the American Federal Constitution felt that such a
separation was essential to a well-ordered free state.
However this may be, the distinction has disappeared
in England, where the executive has a ruling voice
in legislation, and where the legislature interferes
constantly and profoundly with the functions of the
executive. To understand this, the immensely im-
portant functions of a group of officials must be
understood of whom the ancient constitution knew
nothing; whose character and duties, it is said,
indeed, have never been formally laid down. This
group is known as the Cabinet, a name applied at
first by way of reproach. We have seen it appear in
the reign of William and Mary, at which time, to
remedy great embarrassments, the expedient was hit
upon of having the King select his ministers from
the majority in Parliament, that they might be always
in accord with themselves, and have behind them a
power able to carry through whatever schemes they
might have in view. In the "responsible govern-
ment" which has come to pass out of this provision
by a process of evolution comprising many stages,
the Sovereign retains scarcely a shadow of real
inight. The leader of the parliamentary majority
for the time being becomes head of the ministry;
the other prominent men of his party become his
colleagues, and to them solely is committed the exe-
cution of the majority's will. In legislation, it is
left to them to take the initiative ; while in executing
measures that have been resolved upon, the minis-
ters, sitting in their seats, are subjected to constant
questioning and criticism, — a process which the

258 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

minority, the Opposition, always take care shall be
sharp and searching to the last degree. Whenever
a measure of the ministry fails of support from a ma-
jority in Parliament, the ministry falls, the leaders of
the new majority at once stepping into their places.
If the discomfited ministry choose, an appeal can
be made to the country ; Parliament is dissolved, and
elections are ordered for a new Parliament. In the .
elections, the sovereign people express their will:
the ministry may be sustained when the new body
assembles, or it may fail of support. If it has not
the majority on its side, it must cease to exist.

Such in its broad outlines is the shape into which
the polity of England has at last grown. In electing
Present state the Housc of Commous but fcw Euglish-
poi'ity. °* '^ men are now shut out. The Sovereign has
become powerless ; gaining, however, immensely in the
love of the people since it has become clear that she
is their servant and not their mistress. The House
of Lords has no power ; though nominally possessed
of the right to revise and co-operate in the work of
government, its stubborn opposition at any time
could at once be frustrated by the creation, on the
part of the ministry, of new peers in sufficient num-
bers to overcome the resistance. As at the time of
the Reform Bill of 1832, such treatment was threat-
ened, and the Lords at once succumbed, so it must
always be. The Cabinet guides legislation, and
under constant fire from the Opposition pursues
whatever policy it thinks fit. The Cabinet reflects
the majority of Parliament, just as Parliament itself
reflects the nation. A healthful air of publicity
blows through all proceedings. Each syllable uttered

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 259

in the national council, caught by eager reporters, is
spread broadcast next day by means of thousands of
newspapers. Comment of every kind, applause and
fault-finding, are as outspoken in every constituency
as within the Palace of Westminster itself. Govern-
ment of the people, by the people, and for the people,
can proceed but little farther.

Are there grounds for fearing that the people of
England are inadequate to such responsibilities?
Says Lord Farnborough (Sir T. E. May) : " That
Englishmen have been qualified for the Adequacy of
enjoyment of political freedom is mainly JSei^respon-
due to those ancient local institutions by °''"'''""-
which they have been trained to self-government.
The affairs of the people have been administered not
in Parliament only, but in the vestry, the town-coun-
cil, the board-meeting, and the Court of Quarter Ses-
sions. England alone among the nations of the earth
has maintained for centuries a constitutional polity;
and her liberties may be ascribed above all things
to her free local institutions." What misfortunes the
shire-moot and the tun-moot have undergone in their
transmission through the ages we have had occasion
to notice as our survey has proceeded. That they
have been to a large extent overlaid has been made
plain ; and it is certain that in proportion as they have
been thrust back, a baleful torpor and degradation
have fallen upon the people. But though overlaid, the
old local self-government has never been obliterated.
" Since the days of their Saxon ancestors," continues
May, "England's sons have learned at their own
gates the duties and responsibilities of citizens. As-
sociating for the common good, they have become

260 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

exercised in public affairs. Thousands of small com-
munities have become separately trained to self-gov-
ernment, taxing themselves through their representa-
tives for local objects, meeting for discussion and
business, and animated by local rivalries and ambi-
tions." 1

The testimony of the great constitutional historian
is amply borne out by other authorities, among whom
J. Toulmin Smith may be cited. " This system of
local self-government, by which there were fixed,
frequent, and accessible meetings together of the
folk or people, for discussing and determining upon
all matters of common interest (that local self-gov-
ernment that affords the most valuable education
both as to thought and action, the best school for the
faculties of man), is a system the skeleton of which
still exists, though it has been much overlaid. The
fact is clear and unmistakable that such a system of
local self-government, minutely ramified and wisely
devised, has never been quite superseded." ^

In the better England of to-day the signs are hope-
ful for a vigorous revival of what has so long been
The County atrophied. By a sweeping measure of the
counciiB. ygj^p 1888, Parliament, brushing aside a
mass of cumbrous and hurtful mediteval lumber, gave
the government of the shires once more into the
hands of the people after the old fashion. In the
new County Councils, freely elected representatives
once more care for the business of the shires, as did
long ago the Reeves and four men sent by the town-
ships to the central moot, to speak the will of the

1 Constitutional History, II, p. 460.

'^ Local Self-Government and Centralization, p. 29, etc.

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 261

ceorls. As far back as the year 1848 the illustrious
Cobden anticipated what has now come to pass in the
shires, and expressed the belief that the head of each
shire might be an official somewhat analogous to a
State governor in the United States. He felt that
a radical transformation of the House of Lords was
impending, and had an idea of an Upper House
resembling that of America, in which each county
should be represented by two senators.^

An American naturally feels that such a change
would be salutary : it is at any rate quite in the spirit
of the ancient Anglo-Saxon freedom. In municipal-
ities, too, an administrative system far nearer that
of the old borough-moot, so distinctly marked in the
time when the cities were rising, than the oligarchic
abuses that displaced it for so long, has come to pre-
vail. The plain people, while pushing themselves to
the front, have certainly not been neglectful of the
means by which they may best fit themselves for the
responsibilities which they have assumed.

In the transformation of England, so marked since
1832, and by no means as yet at an end, the voices of
the timid are constantly heard deprecating innova-
tions ; and as constantly the voices of scholars and
thinkers declaring that the so-called innovations are
but a reverting to ancient precedents. In the mo-
mentous debate and strife the incidents are sometimes
startling. It has been felt often that no other so
audacious hand has in our generation been ^^^^^
laid upon the very foundations of society ^hemlot
and property as that of Henry George; '"'^'"""■

1 Letter to George Combe, August 28, 1848. Morley: Life of Cobden,
p. 327.

262 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

but to make real Henry George's theory of land-hold-
ing, it is now claimed, it would only be necessary to
revive that primitive system of tenure, in use through
all the early centuries, and never down to the present
moment entirely discontinued, by which the land was
owned by the community, no individual being in such
a sense a proprietor that he could call even his home-
stead his very own.^

In the circumstances, it is only natural for patriotic

Englishmen to wish there was something to balance

and serve as a brake to the car of the

Flexible and

rigid consti- State, as it swavs and plunsres forward along

tutions. ' J i- fci &

these lines of change. Even though prog-
ress be but a return to the old, is the return wise
always? and if wise, would it not be expedient to
return at a far slower rate, with more respectful treai>
ment of mediaeval traditions, — unwisely adopted per-
haps in their day, yet still revered for centuries, and
not to be left behind without much risk to the social
and political framework ? At present, the House of
Commons is omnipotent in the State. As Christian,
the commentator upon Blackstone, expresses it, if the
House of Commons should see fit, like Herod, to pass
a law to kUl all children below a certain age, there is
no authority to restrain it.^ Of Britons of conserva-
tive temper, no spokesman more entitled to respect
has been heard of late years than Sir Henry Maine, ^
who looks across the Atlantic with admiring eyes at
America, deeming her most happy in the possession

1 The Land and the Community, Rev. S. W. Thackeray, 1889. See
also Progress and Poverty, Book VII, Chap. IV.

2 Blackstone's Commentaries, I, p. 91.

' " Popular Government," by Sir Henry Maine.

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 263

of her Supreme Court, her powerful Senate, her rigid,
authoritative instrument behind the legislature, —
checks most effectual when popular whim is dis-
posed to go too fast and too far, checks which
England is utterly without. To reverence the
Constitution is, of course, a sentiment which every
American drinks in with his mother's milk ; and
all who wish well to the mother-land will desire for
her that as she takes on new things, some such
powerful guarantees of order and stability may come.
Possibly it has been, and is still, a fortunate circum-
stance that in this time of reconstruction the British
constitution has been, in Bryce's phrase, "flexible."
When, however, the effete feudalism is thoroughly
sloughed off, one feels that the constitution must be
" rigid," — that there must be some wisely framed
instrument to stand as law over even the law-givers.^

England is not only herself at the present hour
practically a democratic republic, but is the parent of
vast republics in the quarters of the earth most dis-
tant from her.^ In America, Australia, and Africa,
eighty per cent of the territories best adapted by
climate and soil to the habitation of Europeans are in
her possession, and have become the seats of vigorous
and growing Anglo-Saxon peoples. The extent to
which these have become endowed with the ancient
freedom so thoroughly recovered by the mother-land,
can be made plain in a few words. The old colonial
empire, the Thirteen Colonies, which, after revolting,

1 See view of Hon. Seth Low, in Bryce: American Commonwealth,
I, p. 683.

2 Sir T. Erskine May : Constitutional History, H, p. 637.

264 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

became the United States, had been ruled after the
precedents of Spain. The dependencies were regarded
as a source from which the mother-land might be en-
riched, and their interests were neglected and sacri-
ficed in the pursuit by the mother-land of this selfish
end. " Till alienated by the behavior of England, the
colonists had far more kindly feelings toward her
than she had toward them. To them she was the old
home ; to her they were simply customers." ^ Exasper-
ation in the Colonies was the inevitable fruit of so base
a policy, and in the end England, like Spain, lost the
new lands whose rights she had abused. The bitter
experience, as we have seen, perhaps saved her own
freedom ; she derived from it also the wisdom which
enabled her, when presently the vast new colonial
empire fell within her grasp, so to proceed that the
dependencies, instead of chafing under their bond,
cherish it with warm affection, looking upon indepen-
dence as a calamity rather than a blessing.

The independence of America had been not long
secured, when the foremost men of England began

to utter the wiser doctrines as to colonial
Dial Bill of rule, which were to prevail in the future.

In 1791, Pitt introduced a bill for the gov-
ernment of Canada, "remarkable as recognizing for
the first time the wise and generous principle of in-
dependent colonial institutions, which since then has
been fully developed in every dependency of the
British Crown capable of local self-government." ^
At the same time. Fox, though in opposition to Pitt,
exclaimed that " the only method of retaining distant

1 Bryce : American Commonwealth, I, p. 416, note.

2 Massey : History of England from the Accession of George 111,

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 265

colonies with advantage is to enable them to govern
themselves." Both Whigs and Tories share the
credit of this model for all subsequent colonial
constitutions.^

But though the proper plan was recognized, it
was not at once put in practice. England, absorbed
in the struggle of the French revolutionary and Na-
poleonic period, though she snatched from her ene-
mies vast foreign possessions, had little leisure to
organize and administer with care. Canada was neg-
lected until she rose at last in rebellion ; while the
only use found for Australia was as a prison, fenced
ofE from England by many thousand miles of sea,
to which criminals could be transported. By such
transportation much had been done at an earlier
time to blast the prospects of portions of America.
The evil policy was pursued in the South Sea for
many years with so much energy that only ruin
seemed possible for the country which nature had
made so inviting. The day of better things came
with the year 1832, and the admission in England
of a vast body of the plain people to a share in the
government. Parliament became at once in every
way more humane and wise ; and not the least of
the improvements which it introduced into the ad-
ministration of the empire, was the freedom from
home interference which it very soon bestowed upon
the colonies. They rapidly increased until at the
present moment the population of Canada, gathered
into the great provinces, confederated,
after the example of the United States, Greater Bri-
into the Dominion, numbers five million ;

1 Yonge : Constitutional History, p. 128.

266 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the seven great lands that make up Australasia
(New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, West-
ern Australia, Queensland, Tasmania, and New Zea-
land}, together with South Africa, contain as many
more ; and all possess, or are likely very soon to pos-
sess, the same " responsible government " which puts
the mother-country so thoroughly into the hands of
its citizens. A Crown-appointed governor in each
colony represents the Sovereign, and like the Sover-
eign, though possessed of dignity and irremovable
by the people, is quite without real power. A leg-
islative council composed of members, sometimes
elected, sometimes appointed by the governor, forms
an Upper House, no more potent than the House of
Lords. The real power rests with the representa-
tives who sit in the Lower House. As in England,
the leaders of the party in the majority form of
necessity the ministry. If they lose the support of the
majority, at once they fall. An appeal may be made
to the country, indeed; but if the country, in the
elections which then take place, fails to sustain them
by a majority, place must be given to ministers who
stand for what the body of the people demand. In
Canada alone, as yet, a confederation has come about
of the provinces lying from east to west.^ Here
each province has its legislature, in all main features
like the federal legislature, which convenes at Ot-
tawa. The example of the United States near at

1 For the constitution of Canada, see Appendix E. Sir H. Parkes,
premier of New South Wales, says that Canada is to he the model for
Australian federation. In the near future three English-speaking fed-
erations — the United States, Canada, and Australia — are to dominate
the Pacific. — Sir Charles Dilke : Problems of Greater Britain, pp.
58, 59 (1890).

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 267

hand (whose precedents, however, are always criti-
cally scanned) has brought this about. ^

In Australia, there has been as yet no effective
federation of contiguous colonies, though propinquity,
and interests to a large extent common, are making
it imperative. Whether federal or otherwise, the
self-government in each great dependency is com-
plete. Any power of veto which may in a strict
construction of the constitution belong to the gov-
ernor is never exercised, and has as completely
fallen out of use as the veto power of the Sovereign
of England. Though some constitutional writers
still claim that Parliament is supreme over the
colonies, and can annul, if it should choose, any
action of a colonial legislature,^ no assertion of that
supremacy has been made in any conspicuous man-
ner since the unfortunate effort in the reign of
George III ; and if made, would excite indignation
unbounded.^ As the Crown has gained in ease and
popularity what it has lost in power, so the mother-
country, allowing to the full the principles of local
self-government, has won her dependencies to her-

1 As to local self-government, Sir Charles Dilke speaks with enthusi-
asm of that of Canada in general, and calls that of the province of
Ontario " the best in the whole world." Here, elected in each village
and township, appear « "Eeeve and four Councillors," — a complete
revival of the ancient name and usage ; for the Reeves, each with his
four, make up the council of the shire. In Quebec, too, the mayors of
the municipalities make up the county councils, though the name
" Reeve " does not appear.— " Problems of Greater Britain," p. 66.

2 p. 211.

" " Only when the obligations of the empire to a foreign power are
affected, or an imperial statute is infringed, in matters on which the
Canadian Parliament has not full jurisdiction, is the supreme authority
of England likely to be exercised." — Bourinot, quoted by Dilke : Prob-
lems of Greater Britain, p. 518.

268 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

self. As Sir T. E. May remarks t^ "No liberty or
franchise prized by Englishmen at home has been
withheld from their fellow-countrymen in distant
lands. Thus the most considerable dependencies of
the British Crown have advanced until an ancient
monarchy has become the parent of democratic re-
publics in all parts of the globe. The Constitution
of the United States is scarcely so democratic as
that of Canada or Australia. The President's fixed
tenure of oifice and large executive powers, the in-
dependent position and authority of the Senate,
and thfe control of the Supreme Court are checks
upon the democracy of Congress. In these colonies,
the nominees of a majority of the democratic assem-
bly, for the time being, are absolute masters of the
colonial government. England ventured to tax her
colonies and lost them. At last she gave freedom
and found national sympathy and contentment. But
in the meantime her colonial dependencies have
grown into affiliated States. Instead of taxing her
colonies, England now has taxed herself heavily for
them. She may well be prouder of the vigorous
freedom of her prosperous sons than of a hundred
provinces subject to the iron rule of British pro-
consuls. And should the sole remaining ties of
kindred, affection, and honor be severed, she will
reflect with just exultation, that her dominion ceased,
not in oppression and bloodshed, but in the ex-
pansive energies- of freedom, and the hereditary
capacity of her manly offspring for the privileges of
s elf-go vernment. "

1 Constitutional History, II, p. 538, etc. (summarized).

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 269

In 1886 occurred in London a memorable scene^
which a newspaper of the day thus describes : —

" The Queen formally opened the Colonial Exhibi-
tion to-day. The weather was beautiful, with bril-
liant sunshine. Crowds gathered along Colonial Exhi-
the route taken by her Majesty from '''"°° °* "**•
Buckingham Palace and greeted her with enthusiasm.
The main hall, in which the opening ceremonies were
conducted, was crowded with the ilite of London.
The large number of foreign princes and diplomats,
who attended in com-t dress, blended with the scores
of British officers present in full glittering uniforms,
made a magnificent spectacle. The Prince of Wales,
the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Henry of Battenberg
and his wife, Princess Beatrice, and Crown Princess
Victoria of Germany led the royal procession through-
out the building, and were followed by Lord Harting-
ton, the Marquis of Salisbury, the Earl of Derby, and
scores of other noble and distinguished persons.

"A prominent feature of the opening ceremonies
was the ode composed for the occasion by Tennyson.
This was magnificently rendered by a vast choir of
carefully selected voices. The ode was sung just
previous to the Queen's formal declaration that the
exhibition was open. The third portion of the ode
was evidently composed with a view of stimulating
international fraternity between the two great Eng-
lish-speaking nations, and is in the following words : — ■

" Britain fought her sons of yore ;
Britain failed, and never more,
Careless of our growing kin,
Shall we sin our fathers' sin. —
Men that in a narrower day

270 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

(Unprophetic rulers they)
Drove from out the mother's nest
That young eagle of the West,
To forage for herself alone.
Britons, hold your own!

Shall we not, through good and ill.
Cleave to one another still ?
Britain's myriad voices call :
' Sons, be welded, each and all,
Into one imperial whole ;
One with Britain, heart and soul,
One life, one flag, one fleet, one throne.
Britons, hold your own,
And God guard all ! '"

" The Queen was profoundly pleased with the ode
and with the manner in which it was rendered hy the
choir. She nodded and smiled with pleasure, ap-
proved of each sentiment as it was brought out, and
seemed exceedingly to enjoy the enthusiasm which
the poem and music provoked in the vast concourse,
whose applause was hearty, enthusiastic, and long
continued."

Here, then, in America and the British Empire, we

find in the world at present fully one hundred and

ten millions of English^peaking men, all of whom are

■ living under a popular freedom as complete as has

ever been possessed by human beings, gathered in

states, since the foundation of the world.

Extension of rt p

Anglo-Saxon Nor is Anglo-Saxon freedom confined to

freedom to ^ ° ^

other coun- English-spcaking races alone. Europe, in

general, has passed through a century of

revolution. Old institutions have been thrown off,

and there has been in all civilized countries but

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 271

Russia an adoption of the Anglo-Saxon polity, more
or less modified. Such has been the case with
France, Belgium, Holland, Italy, Germany, Hungary,
Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Spain, and Portugal.
In all these lands, except France, which has a Presi-
dent, a Sovereign stands at the head of the state, in
whose name executive acts are done, who is irre-
sponsible and irremovable. The power lies with the
ministers of the Sovereign, nominally appointed by
him, but really owing their positions in a greater
or less degree to the voice of the majority of the
representatives of the people. The representatives,
therefore, through these, their agents, possess execu-
tive as well as legislative power. This is the general
scheme, the details of which vary widely. The su-
premacy of the legislature is most complete in France ;
least so in the German Empire, and in Prussia, where
the power of the Emperor and King is great and not
declining.!

A still farther extension of Anglo-Saxon freedom is
perhaps possible. The two hundred and fifty millions
of India, it is believed, have a capacity for self-govern-
ment. Every village has its headman and a ruling
committee. Sir Henry Maine, in his study of the vil-
lage communities of India, presents interesting points
of correspondence between them and those of other
Aryan peoples. In them exists a germ of local self-
government, if not of representative institutions,
which might be developed far. East Indians often
possess high administrative talent. Mysore and Ba-
roda, two of the largest provinces, within a few years
have been given over to native rule. So it might be in

1 Bryce: American Commonwealth, I, p. 271, etc.

272 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

twenty different states. Why not a gradual substitu-
tion of native for Englisli officers everywhere ? it is
asked. " A native administration, stimulated by Eng-
lish example, and still supervised by Englishmen, is
not an unworthy idea. ... A confederacy of many
states and provinces, each developing peacefully after
its own fashion, and united by a common bond to
the English name, is our dream for the twentieth
century." ^ The humane wish is entertained that
Englishmen, while protecting and guiding, may yet
for the most part surrender the natives of India
to themselves, in the hope that, building upon
the local self-government which has never become
extinct, a government of the people may some day
come out not remotely resembling that of their
masters.^

Anglo-Saxon freedom, however, can only be ordered
and administered with thorough success by Anglo-
Saxon men. For these the impulse has
miniBtered ' come dowu iu the blood, to struggle for it,
Anglo-Won to cherish it, to live under it. To other
races it is something foreign; and as a
strange tongue rarely becomes so free and flowing
upon our lips as the mother-speech, so as regards this
ancient freedom, there is rarely a thorough and easy
adaptation of it to races that have worn chains. It is
destined for the dominion of the world; and this
supremacy it is to gain, not as adopted by peoples to

1 Cotton and Payne : English Colonization and Dependence, English
Citizen Series, p. 87. See, also, the " Westminster Review," January,
1889, article, " Federation vs. War," for a hopeful view of India.

2 See, upon this point, Dilke ; Problems of Greater Britain, pp. 415,
425, 433, 437,

THE NEW COLONIAL EMPIRE. 273

whom it is something alien, but as upheld by the Eng-
lish-speaking race, so many million strong, its separate
nationalities planted at so many points of vantage the
world over, no more one in speech than one in blood
and institutions.

274 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER XVII.

PRESENT CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY.

1789-1890.

While in tlie empire of England, Anglo-Saxon
freedom has thus been adapting itself in throes almost '
revolutionary to the conditions of the nineteenth cen-
tury, how has it fared in America ? The thirteen
States of 1789 have become in one hundred- years
forty-four ; in population, area, resources of every
kind, the Union has multiplied to a wonderful de-
gree. As to constitutional changes, what have we
to note?

The great federal instrument stands substantially

unchanged. The few amendments, famous though

some of them are, wrought out at such

of the Federal cost of blood and treasure, call for no

Constitution. . . -, t . ^m

notice m the present discussion, ihe
clauses of the Constitution have been regarded with
a veneration ever deepening, until it has become
almost superstitious ; to think of meddling with its
provisions is, in the general view, almost an impiety.
As regards the separate commonwealths, while
each one of the forty-four has its peculiarities,^ the
Distrust of general resemblance is close. A tendency
legislatures, -^q greater elaborateness in the written con-

1 See Henry Hitchcock : American State Constitutions, Putuams, 1887.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 275

stitutions is to be noted, as new States have been
added one by one, proceeding so far that in the more
recent instruments a provision for minute details
exists in strong contrast with the older documents.
This circumstance is due to a growing distrust, in the
States, of the legislatures; delegates in so many-
cases prove inefficient, corrupt, or in some way false
to their trust, that the people think fit more and
more to tie their hands. Undoubtedly this deepen-
ing dissatisfaction with legislatures. Congress itself
as well as those of lower rank, is a circumstance full
of ill omen. If the representative body is a failure,
then is Anglo-Saxon freedom a failure, and the
sooner we recur to the system of Strafford or Richard
II, the better. The ideas of those historic figures
are by no means yet obsolete among English-speak-
ing men.i Is Anglo-Saxon freedom no longer well
adapted to English-speaking men? What can be
said about the condition of the primordial cell of
our body-politic ?

In our human bodies, if the cellular tissue is
healthy, the physician is sure all will ultimately go
well. Bones may be broken, sinews condition of
sprained, a blast of malaria may have ceS^o'iTr'*'"'
caused an ague, or improper food dyspep- po°fty,ihf°°
sia. Various kinds of deep-seated trouble p°p"'" "''°'-
may exist, acute and even chronic; but if the pri-
mordial cell everywhere is sound, the patient will
survive. The proper primordial cell of an Anglo-
Saxon body-politic is local self-government by a con-
sensus of individual freemen ; in other words, the

1 See Traill : Life of Strafford, 1889, p. 204, etc., and notice of the
same in London " Saturday Review," November 9, 1889.

276 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

popular moot, the thing back of the representative
body, the primary democracy where the individual
rules, no man's voice weighing more than another's
except in so far as ability and character give him
weight.^ This primordial cell, so fundamental and
needful, — is it in the Union in such condition that
Americans can confidently thrust the shoulder under
the responsibilities which the future has in store ?

A broad division of the population of the United

States may be made into those who live in cities and

those who live in the country, — a division

Examination . . ^ ■, . .

of rural Quitc ucccssary m the present discussion ;

America. (• t i i i» . p

for local self-government is a far more
complicated and embarrassing matter for cities than
for rural populations. In 1790, one thirtieth of the
population of the United States lived in cities of eight
thousand inhabitants or over. The ratio in our time
of the urban to the rural population is very differ-
ent, the proportion of the urban population having
risen to one quarter of the total, and showing a con-
stant increase.^

Looking first at the condition of the rural popula-
tion, we shall find in the various States of the Union
communities to be classed as follows : those in which
prevails, first, the Town system ; second, the County
system; third, the Township-County or Compromise
system.^ In the Town system, confined pretty much
to New England, the population occupying a compara-
tively small area assemble regularly, and themselves

1 H. B. Adams : Germanic Origin of New England Towns, Johns
Hopkins University Studies, 1st Series, No. II, p. 5.

2 Census Reports.

8 S. A. Galpin : Walker's Statistical Atlas of United States, II, p. 10.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 277

discuss and decide upon public matters, electing repre-
sentatiyes to stand in tlieir place in tlie legislatures
of State and Union, but retaining in their own hands
local government. In the County system, that of the
South, the population elect officers upon whom they
throw the burden of local government ; there are no
regular popular moots for the discussion of public
affairs, citizens contenting themselves with the mere
election of the county officials : the latter, if imsatis-
factory, are not subject to check or guidance from any
formally constituted body, but are simply dropped at
the next election. In the Township-County or Com-
promise system, the two other systems are variously
blended : this may be seen in the States of the Mid-
dle and the West.

Beginning our discussion with the Town system, let
us inquire whether New Englanders have preserved
it in its integrity. In the immense dilu- Loeaiseif.
tion which the old stock of New England f°^^nSg.
has undergone through the foreign human '*°'^"
floods which have been poured upon it, its influence
has of necessity been often greatly weakened and the
character of town government has been j„fl„gn„gg
modified, seldom advantageously. While S,e'?o4r"'
multitudes of the ancient strain have for- "«<^''"g-
saken the granite hills, their places have been sup-
plied by a Celtic race, energetic and prolific, whose
teeming families throng city and village, threatening
to outnumber the Yankee element, depleted as it has
been by the emigration of so many of its most vigor-
ous children. To these new-comers must be added
now the French Canadians, who, following the track
of tlieir warlike ancestors down the river-valleys,

278 ' ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

have come by thousands into the manufacturing
towns and into the woods, an industrious but unpro-
gressive race, good hands in the mills and marvel-
lously dexterous at wielding the axe. Whatever may
be said of the virtues of these new-comers, — and, of
course, a long list could be made out for them, — they
have not been trained to Anglo-Saxon self-govern-
ment. We have seen the origin of the folk-moot far
back in Teutonic antiquity. As established in New
England, it is a revival of a most ancient thing. The
institution is uncongenial to any but Teutonic men ;
the Irishman and Frenchman are not at home in it,
and cannot accustom themselves to it, until, as the
new generations come forward, they take on the char-
acteristics of the people among whom they have come
to cast their lot. At present, in most old New Eng-
land towns, we find an element of the population
numbering hundreds, often thousands, who are some-
times quite inert, allowing others to decide all things
for them ; sometimes voting in droves in an unintelli-
gent way as some whipper-in may direct ; sometimes
in unreasoning partisanship, following through thick
and thin a cunning demagogue, quite careless how the
public welfare may suffer by his coming to the front.^
" Though the town-meeting of the New England of
to-day rarely presents all the features of the town-
meeting of the Revolution, yet wherever

Picture of it- ij-i -titi

thirty years the population has remained tolerably pure
from foreign admixture, and wherever the

1 1 have embodied here some material from previous works, Johns
Hopkins University Studies, 2d Series, IV, p. 16, etc., and also the
Life of Samuel Adams, Chap. XXIII. See the latter work for a de-
tailed sketch of the town of Boston, — the most interesting of New
England towns in its most interesting period.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 279

numbers at the same time have not become so large
as to embarrass, the institution retains much of its
old Yigor. The writer recalls the life, as it was
twenty-five years ago, of a most venerable and uncon-
taminated old town, whose origin dates back more
than two hundred years.^ At first it realized almost
perfectly the idea of the Teutonic ' tun.' For long it
was the frontier settlement, with nothing to the west
but woods until the fierce Mohawks were reached,
and nothing but woods to the north until one came
to the hostile French of Canada. About the houses,
therefore, was drawn the protection of a palisade to
enclose them (tynan) against attack. Though not
without some foreign intermixture, the old stock
was, thirty years ago, so far unchanged that in the
various 'deestricks' the dialect was often unmis-
takably nasal; the very bobolinks in the meadow-
grass, and the bumble-bees in the hollyhocks, might
have been imagined to chitter and hum with a Yankee
twang ; and ' Zekle ' squired ' Huldy ' as of yore, to
singing-school or apple-paring, to quilting or sugaring-
off, as each season brought its appropriate festival.
The same names stood for the most part on tax, vot-
ing, and parish lists that stood there in the time of
Philip's war, when for a space the people were driven
out by the Indian pressure; and the Fathers had
handed down to the modern day, with their names
and blood, the venerable methods by which they
regulated their lives. On the northern boundary a
factory village had sprung up about a water-power ;
at the south, too, five miles off, there was some rattle
of mills and sound of hammers. For the most part,

1 Deerfield, Franklin Co., Massachusetts.

280 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

however, the people were farmers, like their ancestors,
reaping great hay-crops in June with which to fatten
in the stall long rows of sleek cattle for market in
December; or by farmer's alchemy, transmuting the
clover of the rocky hills into golden butter.

" From far and near, on the first March-Monday, the
men gathered to the central village, whose people
made great preparations for the entertainment of the
people of the outskirts. What old Yankee, wherever
he may have strayed, will not remember the ' town-
meeting gingerbread,' and the great roasts that
smoked hospitably for all comers ! The sheds of the
meeting-house close by were crowded with horses and
sleighs; for, in the intermediate slush, between ice
and the spring mud, the runner was likely to be bet-
ter than the wheel. The floor of the town-hall grew
wet and heavy in the trampling: not in England
alone is the land represented; a full representation
of the soil comes to a New England town-meet-
ing, — on the boots of the freemen. On a platform
at the end of the plain room sat the five selectmen in
a row, — at their left the venerable town-clerk,^ with
the ample volume of records before him. His memory
went back to the men who were old in Washington's
administration, who in their turn remembered men in
whose childhood the French and Indians burned the
infant settlement. Three lives, the town-clerk's the
third, spanned the whole Mstory of the town. He
was full of traditions, precedents, minutiae of town
history, an authority in all disputed points of pro-
cedure from whom there was no appeal. In front of

1 Charles Williams, Esq., known and beloved far and near as "Dr.
Charles."

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 281

the row of selectmen, witli their brown, solid farmer
faces, stood the Moderator, a vigorous man in the
forties, six straight feet in height, colonel of the
county regiment of militia, of a term's experience in
the General Court, thus conversant with parliamen-
tary law, a quick and energetic presiding officer.^

" It was indeed an arena. The south village was
growing faster than the ' Street,' and there were
rumors of efforts to be made to move the town-hall
from its old place, which aroused great wrath ; and
both south village and 'Street' took it hard that
part of the men of the districts to the north had
favored a proposition to be set off to an adjoining
town. The weak side of human nature came out
as well as the strong in the numerous jealousies and
bickerings. Following the carefully arranged pro-
gramme or warrant, from which there could be no
departure, because ample warning must be given of
every measure proposed, item after item was con-
sidered, — a change here in the course of the high-
way to the shire town ; how much should be raised
by taxes; the apportionment of money among the
school districts; what bounty the town would pay
its quota of troops for the war ; a new wing for the
poor-house ; whether there should be a bridge at the
west ford. Now and then came a touch of humor,
as when the young husbands, married within the
year, were elected field-drivers, — officers taking the
place of the ancient hog-reeves. Once the Moderator
for the time being displeased the meeting by his
ruling as regards certain points of order. 'Mr.
Moderator,' cried out an ancient citizen with a

I Colonel Horatio Hawks.

282 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

twang in his Toice like that of a well-played jew's-
harp, 'if it's in awrder, I'd jest like to inquire the
price of cawn at Cheapside.' It was an effective
reduatio ad absurdum. A rustic Cicero, in a town
not far off, whom for some reason the physicians
of the village had displeased, once filled up a lull
in the proceedings with, 'Mr. Moderator, I move
that a dwelling be erected in the centre of the
graveyard in which the doctors of the town be
required to reside, that they may have always under
their eyes the fruits of their labors.'

" The talkers were sometimes fluent, sometimes
stumbling and awkward. The richest man in the
town, at the same time the town-treasurer, was usu-
ally a silent looker-on. His son, however, president of
the county agricultural society, an enterprising farmer,
whose team was the handsomest, whose oxen the fat-
test, whose crops the heaviest, was in speech forceful
and eloquent, with an energetic word to say on every
question. But he was scarcely more prominent in the
discussions than the poor broom-corn raisers, whose
tax was only a few dollars. There Avas the intrigue
of certain free-thinkers to oust the ministers from the
school-committee, — the manoeuvring of the factions
to get hold of the German colony, a body of immi-
grants lately imported into the factory village to the
north. These sat in a solid mass to one side while
the proceedings went on in an unknown tongue, with-
out previous training for such work, voting this way
or that, according to the direction of two or three
leaders.

" Watching it all, one could see how perfect a democ-
racy it was. Things were often done far enough from

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 283

the best way. Unwise or doubtful men were put in
office, important projects stinted by niggardly appro-
priations, unworthy prejudices allowed to interfere
with wise enterprises. Business was sometimes blocked
by angry disputes over petty questions. Yet in the
main the result was good. This was especially to be
noted, how thoroughly the public spirit of those who
took part was stimulated, and how well they were
trained to self-reliance, intelligence of various kinds,
and love for freedom. The rough blacksmith or shoe-
maker, who had his say as to what should be the
restriction about the keeping of dogs, or the pasturing
of sheep on the western hills, spoke his mind in
homely fashion enough, and possibly recommended
some course not the wisest. That he could do so,
however, helped his self-respect, caused him to take
a deeper interest in affairs beyond himself, than if
things were managed without a right on his part to
interfere ; and this gain in self-respect, public spirit,
self-reliance, to the blacksmith and shoemaker is
worth far more than a mere smooth or cheap car-
rying-on of affairs."

Is there anything more valuable among Anglo-
Saxon institutions than this same ancient popular moot,
this old-fashioned New England town-meet- Tributes to its
ing ? What a list of important men can be ™'"^'
cited who have declared in the strongest terms that
tongue can utter, their conviction of its preciousness ! ^

1 John Stuart Mill : Eepresentative Government, p. 64, etc. De
Tocqueville : De la Ddmoeratie eu Amerique, I, p. 96, etc. J. Toulmln
Smith: Local Self -Government and Centralization, p. 29, etc. May:
Constitutional History of England, II, p. 460. Bluntschli : quoted by
H. B. Adams, Germanic Origin of New England Towns. Jefferson; to

284 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

It has been alleged that to this more than anything
else was due the supremacy of England in America,
the successful colonization out of which grew at last
the United States. France failed precisely for want
of this.^ England prevailed precisely because " nations
which are accustomed to township institutions and
municipal government are better able than any other
to found prosperous colonies. The habit of thinking
and governing for one's self is indispensable in a new
country." So says De Tocqueville, seeking an expla-
nation for the failure of his own race and the victory
of its great rival.^ None have admired this thorough
New England democracy more heartily than those
living under a very different polity. Richard Henry
Lee, of Virginia, wrote in admiration of Massachu-
setts,^ — " where yet I hope to finish the remainder of
my days. The hasty, unpersevering, aristocratic genius
of the South suits not my disposition, and is inconsis-
tent with my views of what must constitute social
happiness and security." Jefferson becomes almost
fierce in the earnestness with which he urges Virginia
to adopt the township. " Those wards, called town-
ships in New England, are the vital principle of their
governments, and have proved themselves the wisest
invention ever devised by the wit of man for the per-
fect exercise of self-government, and for its preserva-
tion. ... As Cato, then, concluded every speech with

Kercheval, July 12, 1816, and to Cabell, February 2, 1816. John Adams :
Letter to his Wife, October 29, 1775. Samuel Adams ; Letter to Noah
Webster, April 30, 1784. R. W. Emerson : Concord Bicentennial Dis-
course, 1835, etc.

1 Lecky : History of the Eighteenth Century, I, p. 387.

2 De la Democratic en Ame'rique, I, p. 423.

8 Life of E. H. Lee : J^etter to John Adams, October 7, 1779, 1, p. 226,

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 285

the words ' Carthago delenda est,' so do I every
opinion with the injunction : ' Divide the counties
into wards ! ' " ^

A vast emigration has gone from New England to
the West, until it is estimated that fully one-quarter
of the population of the United States is settlement of
directly or indirectly of New England "'"^''''•
origin. Skipping the neighborhood of the Hudson
River, which was occupied by the descendants of the
Dutch and the tenants of the old patroon estates, the
New England emigrants close upon a century ago
filled up Central and Western New York. Then
following the parallels of latitude farther west,
hemmed in by the Lakes on one hand, and swerving
little to the southward, except when now and then
attracted by some point of special advantage, they
have penetrated into the Northwest, and are mingled
plentifully with the pioneers of the Pacific Coast.
Have they carried with them the town-meeting?
Grayson, a public character of prominence in the
early part of the century, wrote Madison that in the
settlement of the West "the New Englanders were
amazingly attached to their own custom of planting
by townships." So it has always been. Wherever
they have gone, they have carried the town, and to
some extent the town-meeting. It will be interest-
ing to study the result in some of the newer States.

It is,. perhaps, a law of Western political evolution
that the county should precede the system finally
adopted. In a thinly settled country, the county
organization is simpler and cheaper ; it is, in fact, a
widely extended township, and resembles in every

1 Works, VI, p. 544 , VII, p. 13.

286 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

way the tunseipe, except in the absence of the popu-
lar moot, which the broad distances to be traversed
make impossible.^ The West may be said to have
Ordinance oi begun with the Ordinance of 1787 ; for
^'^"^ though before that scattered settlers had

poured across the AUeghanies into Kentucky, Ten-
nessee, and Ohio, no proper political society had
been in any way as yet formed. At first, in the
Northwest Territory, government was thoroughly
centralized, consisting of a governor, secretary, and
judges, —all appointed by Congress.^ It was not until
a population of five thousand males had

Local self- ■*■■*■ . . ,

government gathered in Ohio, m consequence of the
Marietta effort, that a general assembly ap-
peared. Washington County now occupied one-half
of Ohio, a centralized system still prevailing : this was
intended to be temporary; and when, in 1802, Ohio
became a State, three elective county commissioners
took the place of the appointed functionaries, to
whom was committed the charge of roads, bridges,
ferries, the poor, taxation, sometimes of the schools ;
in short, a general administrative authority. As
Ohio grew, this form of local development in its gen-
eral features remained. The territory was subdi-
vided into counties, and these again into feebly
marked towns ; but no town-meeting appeared, as in
New England, and no county-meeting, or shire-moot,
as in Pennsylvania.^ When population thickened at
any point into a village, a borough or municipality

1 George E. Howard : Introduction to the Local Constitutional His-
tory of the United States, I, p. 149, etc. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins
University, 1889. I am much indebted to Professor Howard's very
scholarly survey.

2 Howard, I, p. 408, etc. s p. 127.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 287

took shape, with mayor and council. The Ohio fash-
ion was presently followed by Indiana, and later by
Iowa, Missouri, and Kansas.

Quite different was the course of events further
north. Let us look first at Michigan. " If you seek
a pleasant peninsula, look around you," is
the motto upon her seal,i and what State ° " ^^°'
of the Union is more beautiful in its situation ? En-
circled everywhere but on the south by the Great
Lakes, the summer heat is tempered salutarily as
these breathe across to one another; and in the
winter the same beneficent neighbors mitigate the
severity of the frost. Nobly timbered and well-
watered, Michigan possesses also vast tracts where
lie open to the sun the many-acred farms; these
"laugh with harvests," which the world nowhere
surpasses when " tickled with the hoe." Thus for-
tunate by nature, the commonwealth has been fortu-
nate in her whole development, as in these latter
days population has poured in upon her, and civil
society has gradually taken shape. To her American
stock have been added the best elements of our for-
eign immigration. Nowhere are the external condi-
tions fairer; nowhere, perhaps, is there more intel-
ligence, enterprise, and moral worth. Her great
university has been the source of benefits incalcu-
lable ; and in symmetrical subordination to it, wisely
planned and well administered, a public-school sys-
tem, exceptionally good, affords an education to
every child within her borders.

The French, . who early o ccupied Detroit, Mack-
inaw, and still other points, had as usual no local

1 " Si peninsulam amoenam quaeris, circumspice."

288 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

self-government; hence, no doubt, the feebleness of
their colonizing here as everywhere.^ Seigneurs held
great estates, as in New France in general, and law,
when not feudal, was military, all being subject to
the convenience of the garrisons. The French set-
tlers enjoyed much personal license, but had no con-
ception of municipal freedom or self-government.
" They received, unquestioning, their law from the
King and their religion from the priests." ^ The
picturesque French era having passed, the British
conquerors transferred Michigan, after a brief pos-
session, into the hands of the United States in 1796,
when an influx began from Western and Central
New York and the States farther east, — in great part,
directly or indirectly, a New England stream. At
once upon occupying the soil, the settlers showed
that tenacious clinging to the town of which Grayson
wrote to Madison. A statesman, perhaps too soon
forgotten, of New England birth, influenced power-
fully the development of Michigan, — Lewis Cass.
As territorial governor, from 1813 to 1831, he used
his large powers, in the important forming years,
to make vigorous everywhere local self-government.
"In proportion," said he, "as government recedes
from the people, it becomes liable to abuse. What-
ever authority can be conveniently exercised in pri-
mary assemblies can be deposited there with safety.
They furnish practical schools for the consideration
of political subjects, and no one can revert to the
history of our Revolutionary struggle, without being

1 Lecky : History of the Eighteenth Century, I, p. 387. De Tocque-
ville : De la Democratie en Am&ique, I, p. 423.

2 Johns Hop]£ins University Studies, 1st Series, V, p. 9. E. W. Bemis.

CONDITION OP THE AMERICAN POLITY. 289

sensible that to their operation we are indebted for
much of the energy, unanimity, and intelligence
which were displayed by our people at that important
crisis. These institutions have elsewhere produced
the most beneficial effects upon the character of
communities and upon the general course of public
measures." ^

Michigan was the first State of the West to adopt
the town-meeting, but certain noteworthy changes
mark the transferrence. In New England of the
seventeenth century scarcely any two towns were
exactly alike, though the general type was the same.
The new towns of the West, however, are duplicates
of one another. The Western town-meeting has lost
some of the attributes of the primitive moot. Pop-
ular enthusiasm is less pronounced in it : it has be-
come a commonplace business-meeting, the ancient
democratic elements having yielded in part to a rep-
resentative plan. Of the officials whom it elects,
the highest is the supervisor; and in every county
the township supervisors uniting, form the County
Board, which possesses large administrative functions.
In this form of procedure, the precedent of New York
in 1705 is followed ; and in this we find in its best
estate the Township-County or Compromise system.
We need not be sorry, thinks Professor Howard, that
the more democratic way has thus yielded in part to
" the more efficient and less demonstrative methods
of representative government. Its powers are com-
mensurate with the needs of a more fully developed
society, and there is no reason to regret that the exces-

1 Quoted by E. W. Bemis : Johns Hopkins University Studies, 1st
Series, V, p. 12.

290 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM

sive publicity and obtrusive functionalism of primi-
tive New England have not been perpetuated." ^ By
1827, before its admission to the Union, Michigan
had definitely fixed its Township-County organization
in which she has been followed since by Illinois,
Wisconsin, and Nebraska. "In the States of this
group," says Howard, " localism finds its freest ex-
pression : the town-meeting possesses powers com-
mensurate with the requirements of modern life ; ^
the primitive and proper nexus between scir and tun-
scipe is restored ; the township is under the county,
but represented there. The County Board of Super-
visors is the old scir-moot over again. The Town-
ship-County system of the Northwest is one of the
most perfect products of the English mind, worthy
to become, as it may not improbably become, the
prevailing type in the United States." ^

Let us glance for a moment at the career of still
another great commonwealth which has come into

being, like Michigan, in that vast North-
in Illinois. L . ,. T,T ■ ^

west ierritory ot a century ago, — lUmois.*
Like Michigan, its first white population was French,
whose characteristics at Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and Fort
Chartres were no doubt the same as at Detroit.
In 1778, the Northwest Territory was conquered
by Virginia, in a military enterprise quite inde-
pendent of the Continental Congress, from the Eng-

1 Local Self-Government in the United States, I, p. 162.

2 A New Englander cannot help feeling that the Western town-meet-
ing has lost far too much of the character of its prototype of the East-
em States, whatever its gains may have heen.

' Local Selt-Government in the United States, I, p. 158.
* Albert Shaw : Local Government in Illinois, Johns Hopkins Univer-
sity Studies, 1st Series, III.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN tOLITY. 291

lish, who had enjoyed a brief period of possession.
The enterprise and courage shown in the conquest
by Major George Rogers Clarke, the commander
of the force, were paralleled by the magnanimity
with which, for the sake of the public peace and
welfare, Virginia again resigned her acquisition, that
it might become the possession of the United States.
Illinois, however, had received a distinct Virginia
impress, which became more marked as time went
on, the population which flowed in being almost
exclusively from Virginia and her child, Kentucky,
with some infusion from North Carolina. In 1809,
Illinois became a Territory, its present limits being
defined ; in 1818, a State, the settlements thus far
being almost entirely in the southern part, and the
organization after the southern or County system.
The entire administration in each one of the fifteen
counties into which the State had been divided was
given to three commissioners, elected by the people,
to whom the people surrendered all public manage-
ment, with little or no oversight of their own.

But Congress had taken a step which led to im-
portant results. In surveying the public domain.
Congress had caused the lands to be divided into
sections six miles square, to which were given the
name of townships. In each township a square mile
of land was set off for a school fund, the town-
ship becoming a body corporate and politic for school
purposes, authorized to maintain schools, and offi-
cers necessary for their administration. The Illinois
township was at first far enough from the New
England township, being in many cases quite unin-
habited; but there is much in a name. As popula-

292 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

tion came in, the school served the same purpose
which had been served in the earlier day by the
meeting-house.^ The religious faiths of the immi-
grants were various, not all of one stripe, as in the New
England beginning. Nor was there any compulsory
law as to church attendance. Each family, however,
settled within convenient reach of the school-house,
for which in each township such liberal public pro-
vision had been made. Gradually the election dis-
tricts in which the county officers were chosen came
to coincide with the congressional townships, the
school-house becoming a convenient voting-place.

In 1820, an important crisis occurred. Missouri
having been admitted to the Union as a slave state,
Southern immigration was largely diverted thither ;
while at the same time New Yorkers and New Eng-
landers flowed into Northern Illinois. A fierce
struggle set in between North and South over a new
constitution, — a struggle which did not culminate
until 1847, when it was established that the legis-
lature should make a general law for the organization
of townships, the township and not the county to be
the political unit, — under which law any county
might act when a majority of its voters saw fit to do
so. As time has passed, the old animosity has
declined, and the State, north and south, has come in
general to feel the advantages of the township. Of
the one hundred and two counties which Illinois
to-day contains, only twenty-three have refused the
Township organization, preferring instead the County
system with its very imperfect local self-government.
The Illinois system, like that of Michigan, is not

1 p. 116.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY 293

that of New England ; possibly, it is in some ways
a better one, the supervisors sitting, each for his
township, on the county board, like the ancient
reeves in the shire-moot. As regards the great pur-
poses which local self-government may serve, aside
from the convenient despatch of business, — to evoke,
namely, from the individual citizens who are forced
to administer it, a vivid interest in public concerns,
and to impart to them an education which above all
things the freeman requires, — the system is efficient.
Upon the map, the great State of Illinois extends,
blocked out in its counties, with something of the
square precision of a chess-board. In the game
which must always go forward in a society between
the spirit of civilization on the one hand, and the
forces of anarchy and disorder on the other, it is
cheering to feel that on so fair a field as this at
least there can be little doubt as to which shall
receive checkmate.

The condition of self-government in the West
need not be set forth at greater length. It is at its
best estate in the Township-County system The Town-
of Michigan, Illinois, "Wisconsin, and Ne- syl^eSTS" tL
braska. It is in least satisfactory form ^°'^"'^««'-
in Ohio, Indiana, Missouri, and Kansas, where the
County system prevails, and self-government is not
brought vigorously home to the individual man
through a well-developed township environment.
As new States have been constituted, and as the
older States have gone forward in their growth, vari-
ous intermediate types have been presented. By a
law of 1879, for instance, in Missouri, the same
option was offered to the counties to take, if they

294 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

chose, a Township organization, as was offered to the
counties of Illinois. Of the one hundred and four-
teen Missouri counties, however, but eighteen have
as yet adopted the Township organization. Never-
theless, the tendency is in that direction as popular
tion grows dense, and Missouri may be regarded as
undergoing a transition. Iowa, Minnesota, and the
Dakotas occupy a position intermediate ; the town-
ship has more extended powers than in Ohio, pos-
sessing, for instance, an annual town-meeting for
legislation as well as election. The township, how-
ever, has no representation upon the county board,
which consists of commissioners few in number,
sometimes not more than three, sometimes seven or
eight, elected at large, and exercising wide control.^
It is claimed for this form that it is more cheap and
efficient than the more numerous county board made
up of township supervisors ; on the other hand, it is
said to offer dangerous facilities to the formation of
"court-house rings." Professor Howard holds it
to be less consonant with Anglo-Saxon precedents
and a falling short of the highest ideal of social self-
government. In the new States of the Pacific Coast
and the inchoate societies of the mountain and desert
regions which lie back of them, the Township-County
plan is approached in those lying toward the North ;
the County plan in those of the Centre and South.

The County plan prevailed until the Civil War
throughout the entire South. We have seen that in

Virginia, to such an extent the parent
eystemof lie and typical colony of the South, the form

of society originally established approached

1 Howard : Local Constitutional History, I, p. 158.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 295

that of contemporary England. There were, namely,
vast landed estates, which descended by primogeni-
ture, — a system inevitably resulting in an aristocracy
with which lay all social and political prestige, while a
great proportion of the population were in a depressed
condition. The cultivation of tobacco, stimulating
as it did negro slavery and increasing the tendency
to scatter, already marked through the prevailing
form of land-tenure, made anything like a popular
moot impossible. There were, to begin with, few
yeomen, small independent farmers, as in New Eng-
land, the class to whom the moot was . almost a nec-
essary appurtenance ; in the wide distribution of
population, any consensus, whether obtained in
formal moot, or through informal talk, was scarcely
possible. Great counties were practically the pri-
mary divisions, whose officers, justices appointed by
the governor, or, indeed, provided for after the man-
ner of a close corporation, performed all adminis-
trative functions with small responsibility to the
people.

As the South came forward, Virginia continued to
be scarcely less typical than in the early period.
Cotton, which grew to be king over so vast a dis-
trict, as tobacco had been in the Old Dominion, was
equally potent in promoting slavery, a system of large
plantations rather than small holdings, an aristocracy
in whose hands should lie all power, and a vast class
of poor whites with few of the qualities of freemen :
it was equally potent, too, in discouraging town life
and all forms of the moot. Everywhere through the
South and Southwest the County system prevailed, its
functionaries qualified by the oligarchy in power

296 ANGLO-SAXON" FREEDOM.

through some form of appointment or election, but
subject to no popular control, and with no shadow
of responsibility to any form of folk-moot.

Since the war, however, noteworthy changes have
been in progress. In the New South, mining, com-
merce, and manufactures have largely thrust into the
background the old plantation life. Slavery is abol-
ished. A more democratic spirit prevails, and as a
natural consequence the disposition grows active to
cherish the safeguards of Anglo-Saxon freedom. First
among such safeguards the public school lifts its head.
The school system of the North is rapidly making its
way in the South, and " is likely to prove the model
for the entire transformation of the social body." ^
In Virginia, Kentucky, Texas, and Tennessee, the
people vote school taxes and choose school officers ;
in Alabama the township has been formally instituted
mainly for this purpose. The school district, with
its belongings, is being firmly driven by the new
democratic spirit into the ancient Southern frame-
work, and plainly is an entering wedge for local
self-government on a larger scale. Clearly, the
school-meeting is to be a preparation for the town-
meeting.^ In the salutary changes, Virginia, as ever,
is a leader. In 1869, in days oi disfranchisement,
the Township-County system was projected for her ;
and promptly repudiated, in 1874, when the State
was restored to herself. In what was substituted,
however, the best features of the rejected plan were
retained, all terminology being avoided which smelt
of the " carpet-bag." Each county was divided into

1 Howard, Local Constitutional History, I, p. 237.

2 E. W. Bemis, quoted by Howard, Loc. Const. Hist., I, p. 237.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 297

not less tlian three divisions to which the name of
" magisterial districts " was attached, the abhorrent
word "township" being ignominiously cast out.
Each such district has its elected supervisor among
other functionaries, and the supervisors constitute,
after the best precedents, the county board. Again,
each larger district is subdivided into school districts.
West Virginia and North Carolina show a similar
change.^

As Mr. Bryce summarizes, the Union may be di-
vided into three zones, — northern, middle, and
southern. The northern zone extends from the con-
fluence of the Yellowstone with the Missouri east-
ward to the Bay of Fundy, and includes the Dako-
tas, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, and
New England. There the town-meeting in prepon-
derant activity is the unit of local government. The
middle zone stretches from California to New Jersey
and New York along the fortieth parallel. This is
characterized by the Compromise system ; in a part of
the States one side of the organization preponderating,
in part the other. All, however, are alike in this, —
you cannot lose sight for a moment of the larger or
smaller area. The third zone includes all the South-
ern States. Here the county is predominant, though
here and there school districts, and even townships,
are growing in significance.^

The town-meeting, he continues, has been not only
the source, but the school of democracy ; but the ac-
tion of so small a unit needs to be sup- Advantages of

1 .1 1 • • j_ j_ 1 the Townehip-

plemented, perhaps m some points to be county sys-
supervised, by that of the county ; and in ^'"'

1 Howard, I, p. 233. ^ Bryce : American Commonwealth, I, p. 582.

298 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. •

this respect the mixed system of the Middle States is
deemed to have borne its part in the creation of a per-
fect type. An assimilative process has been going on
for some time, tending to the evolution of such a
type all over the United States. In adopting the
Township system of New England, the Northwest
States have borrowed some of the attributes of the
County system of the Middle States. The Middle
States, moreover, have developed the township into a
higher vitality than it formerly had among them.
Some of the Southern States are introducing the town-
ship, and others are likely to follow as they advance
in population and education. It is possible that by
the middle of the next century there will prevail one
system, uniform in its outlines, over the whole country,
with the township for its basis, and the county as the
organ called to deal with those matters, which, while
they are too large for township management, it seems
inexpedient to remit to the unhealthy atmosphere of
a State capital.^

As to efficient local self-government, then, the

proper primordial cell of our body politic, the rural

communities of America, may be said to

Examination . ,, , . - i -i i

of urban promisc Well, on the whole : while short-
America. . -, , .

comings abound, improvement may be an-
ticipated, with a good prospect of a desirable out-
come. But as yet we are far from having finished
our examination. At countless points in the West
population has grown dense, and a form of govern-
ment at once assumed in which the individual dis-
charges himself of a great part of his responsibility.

1 Bryce: American Commonwealth, I, pp. 591, 592.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN" POLITY. 299

In the older States along the seaboard, municipalities
have increased vastly in size and number, with a simi-
lar result. One quarter, nearly, of the sixty millions
of America are dwellers in cities ; in some States,
as New York, more than one-half, and the

c T T T T Growth and

proportion oi the urban to the rural popu- muiupucauou

, . . , . . -^ ^ of cities.

lation IS constantly increasing.

It is not necessary to regard this fact as a calamity.
In Australia, the proportion of the urban to the rural
population is far larger than with us and excites no
alarm. Sydney and Adelaide alone contain about
thirty-five per cent of the people of their respective
colonies, and Melbourne a. still higher per cent. In
each case "the population of the colony, generally
speaking, gains, from the concentration in the capitals,
in education, in power of recreation, and in many of
the matters which make life most pleasant. The
effect must be a quickening of the national pulse, and
is already, in fact, visible in the brightness and high
intelligence of the Australian people." The Austra-
lians contend that the people are not drawn from pro-
duction, but only concentrated for business and social
life, and that the whole civilized world is coming to
this.^ Americans have not as yet learned to take so
cheerful a view as this, chiefly from the fact that
the problem of city government has so far not been
mastered.

" When a community of moderate size, which has
gone forward under its town-meeting, at length in-
creases so far as to be entitled to a city charter, the
day is commonly hailed with ringing of bells and
salutes of cannon. Is it really a time to be rejoiced

I Dilke : Problems of Greater Britain, p. 497.

300 ANGLO-SAXON FKEEDOM.

over ? What does it mean ? This — that the people
cease to govern themselves : once a year they choose
those who are to govern for them. Instead of the
town-meeting discussions and votes, one must now
spend only ten minutes perhaps in a year: no more
listening to long debates about schools, roads, and
bridges ; one has only to drop a slip of paper contain-
ing a list which some one has been kind enough to
prepare for him, into a box, and he has done his duty
as a citizen. In the most favorable circumstances,
the mayor and common council, representing the
citizens, do the work for them, individuals being dis-
charged from the somewhat burdensome, but so quick-
ening and educating duties of the moot. That things
are constantly tending to this is one of the most per-
plexing and threatening features of our system. The
assuming of a city charter is said to be an almost
complete abnegation of practical democracy." ^

The government of cities, says Bryce, is the one
conspicuous failure in the United States.^ To what
Their govern- shall wc turu to savc ourselvcs? is the ques-
^oonepiraoM tion in a thousand cities of America, the
failure. ^^^ q£ agouy and despair being stronger in

our metropolis. New York, than anywhere else. The
able editor lashes the respectable citizen for his indif-
ference to politics, and to such charges are made replies
Uke this : " It is sheer nonsense to say to a modern
New York merchant, 'Take an interest in politics,
attend primaries, find men to accept ofiice, canvass
your acquaintances, and watch the men elected.' His
mind must be occupied from morn till night with

1 F. W. Allen, in the New York " Nation," May 29, 1866.
'■' American Commonwealtli, I, p. 608.

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 301

business; he will go to the wall else." And still
another expresses the thought more fully : " There is
a tendency to differentiation in modern society. At'
first all had leisure for politics ; we were a nation of
farmers, planters, and a few shopkeepers. Our mer-
chants then had leisure. Now, life is much more
intense through steam and the telegraph. If a mer-
chant attends to politics, he perils his success in busi-
ness. If he gives time to it, he is ruined. It is the
great law of division of labor, not neglect of duty,
which has made politics a trade. Politics iii every
land is in the hands of a leisure class. Through a
bad system of representation we exclude our best
men : our leisure class are the wretches."

In the past days of our race, as towns have grown
into cities, exchanging the borough-moot for the
board meetings of the mayor and aldermen, the peo-
ple have become indifferent to freedom. We are
now exposed to the same danger, and the danger is
complicated for us from the circumstance that there
has been poured upon us a flood of immigrants of all
races, who, without a particle of discipline, have been
suffered to lay hold of our ordered Anglo-Saxon
liberty.

While the distressing picture of municipal misrule
is unrolled before our eyes, especially in New York,
but also in every large city of the country,

n /• 1 • rrn EagerneBS to

there is one hopetul circumstance. The remedy the

■*■ abuses.

danger is fully felt, and great energy is
directed to the discovery and application of remedies.
In the extravagance, corruption, rapacity, which
threaten to destroy the social fabric, the strongest
minds come hurrying with appliances, as in a con-

302 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

flagration, the vigorous men run witli bucket, axe, and
rope. I have a collection of suggestions made dur-
ing recent years. Says Mr. Grace, late mayor of
New York : " In our municipalities, the people have
never been permitted actually to realize the dignity
and responsibility of self-government. They have
practically been denied the right to that experience,
which brings with it the only political education that
renders a people capable of self-government," and he
cries out against corrupt legislative interference as
the main source of evU. Says the New York Nation,
" The evil is in giving power into the hands of a pen-
niless, ignorant proletariat; political power lies not
in the hands of the people, but the mob. Democracy
hardly exists in these communities," and a plan is
propounded for securing influence to property and
intelligence. Says the International Review, "The
government of a modern city is analogous to the
administration of property, to that, for instance, of
a railway or a bank, and requires to be cared for
in similar ways." ^

One of the latest and certainly the most authorita-
tive voice that has considered the matter, is that of
Hon. Seth Low, president of Columbia

Views 01 -^

Hon. Seth College, and late mayor of the large city of
Brooklyn. He finds, as do all, a contin-
ually disturbing factor in the immense tide of immi-
gration, eighty per cent of the population of New
York being either foreign born or the children of
foreign parents. In the growth of American cities,
everything must be created or arranged anew ; the
marvel really is not so much that they are open to

1 rv, p. 16L

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 303

criticism for many defects, but rather that results so
great have been achieved in so short a time. Charters
have been framed as though cities were little States.
Americans are only just learning, after many years
of bitter experience, that they are not so much little
States as large corporations. To this mistake have
been due many of the errors in city management.
The aim has been to make a city government where
no officer by himself should have power to do much
harm, and the natural result was to create a situation
where no officer had power to do much good. Men
are coming to see that cities are large corporations ;
and as such, one man in them must be given the
power of direction and the choice of his chief assist-
ants : power and responsibility must go together from
the top to the bottom of every successful business
organization. In the charter granted in 1882, to the
great city of Brooklyn, then of seven hundred and
fifty thousand people, the mayor is entirely respon-
sible for the conduct of the city government on its
executive side, and equipped with powers necessary
to discharge his trust. Mr. Low believes that the
ideal city charter should be founded upon the theory of
separation of the legislative and executive functions ;
that the board of aldermen should have no more
power of interference with the executive than the
House of Representatives has ; that the mayor should
have the power of appointment and removal of execu-
tive officers during the time for which he is responsible
for the government; that there should be constitu-
tional restrictions as to the incurring of debt; and
that the power of the State legislature to interfere in
municipal matters should be reduced to a minimum.

304 ANGLO-SAXON FEEEDOM.

He says, hopefully and manfully: "I have a feel-
ing that our progress, if slow, is steadily in the
direction of betterment. I do not expect to see the
history of the next twenty years in the affairs of our
cities repeat all the scandals that have marked the
past twenty years. It is not strange that a people
conducting an experiment for which there is abso-
lutely no precedent, should have to stumble towards
correct and successful methods through experiences
which may be both costly and distressing. I see no
other road towards improvement in the coming time,
but I think it certain that in another decade we
shall look back on some of the scandals of the pres-
ent in city government with as much surprise, as we
now regard the effort to control fires by a volunteer
fire department, which was insisted upon in New
York until within twenty years. In other words, I
take no gloomy view of the situation. I see nothing
in the general condition of affairs which is absolutely
incurable, unless it be the unwillingness of the people
themselves to choose their local officials along divis-
ions on local lines. I confess that it is here that
the problem appears to me the most difficult. I hope
for good results in this direction, however, from the
growth of sentiment in favor of civil service reform,
whereby patronage shall become less and less power-
ful in the determination of election contests ; from
legislation which, in controlling to some extent the
cost and methods of conducting canvasses, may re-
duce to a minimum the mischief wrought by the
improper use of money. I do not expect to live
long enough to see the government of cities in Amer-
ica anything other than a pressing problem, but it is
a problem everywhere."

CONDITIOISr OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 305

Above all, Mr. Low's experience has inspired him
with confidence in, not with distrust of, the people.
"Because there is scum upon the surface of a boil-
ing liquid, it does not follow that the material or the
process to which it is subjected is itself bad. Uni-
versal suffrage, as it exists in the United States, is
not only a great element of safety in the present
day and generation, but is perhaps the mightiest
educational force to which the masses of men have
ever been exposed. In a country where wealth
has no hereditary sense of obligation to its neigh-
bors, it is hard to conceive what would be the
condition of society, if universal suffrage did not
compel every one having property, to consider, to
some extent at least, the well-being of the whole
community." ^

As regards local self-government, then, there is no
ground for hopelessness as to the future of America.
In rural communities, the popular moot, Grounds for a
adapted to our new conditions, but with ^"p^^"^™^-
its administrative efficiency and its salutary educa-
tive power not lost, persists in New England, is
spreading West, and even South. With respect to
cities, while the embarrassments are great, there is
no reason for feeling that a good way to govern them
will not some day be found. A town-meeting plan
is unquestionably quite inadequate ; but whatever
be the method, why need we doubt that it can safely

1 Bryce : American Commonwealth, I, Chap. LII (chapter by Hon.
Seth Low), "The Problem of Municipal Government in the United
States." (Address at Cornell University, March 16, 1887 ; repeated in
substance at Johns Hopkins University.)

306 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

rest on a basis of universal suffrage? If the folk
vote, the folk will also, in some way, moot the
merits of candidates and of questions upon which it
must pass judgment. If the primordial cell is sound,
the body will not perish.

To candid foreign eyes we offer no unpromising
spectacle. "Local self-government will doubtless
sometimes go wrong, but so too will government
officials. A few mistakes are a small price to pay
for freedom. Compare France and America. The
agitation of France is aggravated, if not caused, by
centralization. Under every regime Paris has been
France ; the provinces have been powerless ; the
best statesmen of France are making every effort
to decentralize. Centralization emasculates public
spirit, induces a careless indifference to the welfare
of the community, takes away the sense of responsi-
bility in local affairs, tends to produce a degrading
subserviency to the powers above, and is in every
way destructive of that manly feeling of individual
freedom with combined action which has hitherto
been held as the glory and boast of our English
institutions. Compare with France the system of
the United States, where democratic and local insti-
tutions have acquired a development and ascendency
elsewhere unknown. No doubt, a thousand faults
may be discovered. The Tammany ring, the ini-
quities of the New York municipality, venality and
corruption in various forms, may be raked up and
combined to form a hideous picture. But turn to
the other side. Where is there, on the whole, a
more law-abiding people ? Where is individual lib-
erty more enjoyed? Where, indeed, has the true

CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN POLITY. 307

English principle of local self-government been de-
veloped with such success ? " ^

1 Cout&mporary Review, 34, p. 678, etc., art. " Self-Governinent in
Towns," by J. Allanson Plcton. For a hopeful view of tlie prospects
of the United States, and also of Canada and Australia, as regards the
disappearance of political corruption, see Dilke : Problems of Greater
Britain, p. 103.

308 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE EUTUEE OF ANGLO-SAXON FEEEDOM.

The progress of Anglo-Saxon freedom lias been
outlined in these pages tkrough eighteen hundred
years, from the Germans of Tacitus to the present
moment. It is now in place to consider what may
fairly be anticipated for it in years to come, and to
inquire whether the generation of English-speaking
men now upon the stage is doing what may reason-
ably be expected of it, in yiew of the opportunities
it enjoys and the responsibilities with which it is
trusted. Though Anglo-Saxon freedom in a more
or less partial form has been adopted (it would be
better perhaps to say imitated) by every nation in
Europe, but Russia, and in Asia by Japan, the hopes
for that freedom, in the future, rest with the English-
speaking race. By that race alone it has been pre-
served amidst a thousand perils; to that race alone
is it thoroughly congenial ; if we can conceive the
possibility of the disappearance among peoples of that
race, the chance would be small for that freedom's
survival. They are the Levites to whom, in especial,
is committed the guardianship of this ark, so infinitely
precious to the world. In no century of its career
has the band understood so well the sacred character
of its responsibility, and looked with such love upon
the trust it was appointed to defend.

FUTURE OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 309

One of the latest and best of historians believes it
possible that the two branches of English-speaking
men will always remain separate political
existences, — that the older, indeed, may the wide

.1 1*11 spread of the

sometime agam break into two or more Engiuh-
nations. He predicts, however, that all
will become one in spirit, and before fifty years have
passed, change the face of the world. Two hundred
million of English-speaking men he beholds with
prophetic glance in the valley of the Mississippi,
fifty million in Australia, and a growth commen-
surate in the other vast regions which our far-roam-
ing brethren have possessed. Before this enormous
increase, other peoples are destined to sink into the
second rank. The inevitable issue is to be that the
primacy of the world will lie with us. English
institutions, English speech, English thought, are to
become the main featmes of the political, social, and
intellectual life of mankind.^

A pamphlet widely circulated during the past
decade contemplates the future of the English-speak-
ing race and their institutions with still more enthu-
siasm.2 In a hundred years, says Mr. Zincke, the
United States will have a population of 800,000,000 ;
Canada, 64,000,000; Australia, 48,000,000; South
Africa, 16,000,000; Great Britain and Ireland, 70,-
000,000 : altogether, in his estimate, there will be
1,000,000,000, substantially the same in language, in-
stitutions and ideals. The United States will have
overflowed southward and into the islands of the

1 J. R. Green : History of the English People, IV, p. 270, etc.

2 By Rev. F. Barham Zincke, Chaplain to the Queen ; reviewed in
New York " Nation," April 5, 1883.

310 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Pacific. Our limits will touch those of Australia and
New Zealand, which on their side, too, will flow out.
In South Africa, also, the "Englishry" will have won-
derfully multiplied and poured into the regions lying
northward, which Livingstone and Stanley have laid
open and are proving to be habitable. The flower of
the species, therefore, says the writer, who has no
mean idea of our stock, will have come, in the course
of a century, to occupy the fairest parts of the planet.
What will be the nature of the society which one
hundred years from now will be thus widespread?
It will be fundamentally the same in manners and
ideas, with slight differences due to climate and
soil. Mr. Zincke has made himself well-known in
England by his strenuous opposition to "landlord-
ism," and his able advocacy of " peasant proprietor-
ship." The immense estates, consisting of many
thousands of acres, sometimes almost of whole coun-
ties, which exist in England, Scotland, and Ireland,
where the owners are often absentees, scarcely see-
ing their lands from one year's end to another, and
where the occupants are merely tenants, at the will
of the landlord as regards rent, and liable to ejection
at any time if he should see fit to turn his pasture
into a game preserve, or prefer to have a great tract
occupied by farms changed into a lordly park, —
these immense estates, our writer regards as produc-
ing immense evil for the population. Let them be
broken up into small holdings, upon each one of
which shall live, as in days of yore, the yeoman, inde-
IJendent in spirit, because he feels that he owns the
land he tills; patriotic, for he has a stake in the
country that bore him; intelligent and energetic.

FUTUKB or ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 311

because in the exercise of the thousand rights and
responsibilities which belong to a condition of free
proprietorship, the mind becomes in every way-
stimulated and trained. Let us have back again,
urges Mr. Zincke, our old English yeoman ; or, as he
does not hesitate to say, let us have the American
farmer, which is the same thing. He feels sure that
this is the type which will come to prevail ; and in
the great " Englishry," the billion of English-speak-
ing men who a hundred years from now are to
occupy the fairest portions of the earth, the American
farmer, in his idea, will furnish the type of the new
society. There will be few savages, no serfs, or
slaves, — not many drones or Sybarites, — none with-
out civilization. All will be able to read and write,
have homes of their own, hold enough land to yield
to intelligent industry a good support. They will
have no social or political superiors ; they will
manage for themselves their own business, — Abra-
ham Lincoln's " government of the people, by the
people, and for the people." Society, legislation,
administration of • affairs, will be to them a most
effective means of education. At the head of all,
though not necessarily in one nationality with the
rest, will stand the United States, our President the
foremost man, American ideas (which, as Horace
Walpole saw, and we may now so plainly see, are the
oldest English ideas), regulating the whole vast
society. " The dream is rather wild, perhaps," says
the Nation, "but we doubt if any one can read it,
without, when he lays it down, finding it very hard
to furnish a good reason for doubting it."

Without being over-sanguine, we can entertain

312 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

anticipations as glowing as these. Quite in the spirit
of the writer whose views have just been summarized,
Mr. Gladstone declared at Paris, September 8, 1889 :
"A hundred years ago, the English-speaking popu-
lation of America amounted to 3,000,000 ; it now
amounts to 60,000,000, and we are told with every
appearance of probability, that in another hundred
years it will amount to 600,000,000. Under these
circumstances, I wish to recognize the right of Amer-
ica to be considered as being prospectively, and even
now to a certain extent, — for we have not in our
small islands yet quite touched 40,000,000, — I wish
to recognize the prospective and approaching right
of America to be the great organ of the powerful
English tongue."

Of what type are the men to whom the dominion
of the world is about to be so largely committed?
Blood of the '^^^ tonguc they speak is English, strength-
though'en-""^*' encd and enriched by infusions from every
eign'admix"'^' pcoplc with whom they have ever come in
''"'°" contact. The freedom in which they have

been nursed is English, though here and there in
their institutions are features which have been caught
from races outside. Can it also be said that the stock
is still fundamentally English, however large may
have been the inpouring into its veins of foreign
blood ? When among our kin beyond the sea it was
urged not long since that in the people of England,
the Anglo-Saxon had been superseded, — that Celt,
Frank, Scandinavian, Hollander, Huguenot, — the
multitude of invaders and immigrants through a thou-
sand years, • — had reduced the primitive element to
insignificance, it was well replied by Mr. Freeman : —

FUTURE OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 313

" In a nation there commonly is a certain element
which is more than an element, something which is
its real kernel, its real essence ; something ^^^ ^^ ^^^^
which attracts and absorbs all other ele- "*°-
ments, so that other elements are not co-ordinate
elements, but mere infusions into a whole which is
already in being. ... If after adopting so many. . .
we remain Englishmen none the less, surely a new
witness is brought to the strength of the English
life within us, — a life which can thus do the work
of the alchemist, and change every foreign element
into its own English being." ^

A similar statement might be made as regards
America. From the twenty thousand Englishmen who
between the years of 1620 and 1640 came to New Eng-
land, it is estimated that one quarter of the sixty mil-
lions of our present population are derived. From the
English who settled elsewhere in the Thirteen Colo-
nies, an equal, perhaps a larger, increase has proceeded.
The stranger, indeed, has been with us from the
beginning : Frenchman and Spaniard preceded us ;
Celt, Swede, Dutchman, and German came with us
in the earliest ships. The overflow of Europe, and
latterly even of Asia, has been poured upon us in an
inundation ; yet the English stock remains, — "the ele-
ment which is more than an element, the real kernel,
the real essence ; something which attracts and absorbs
all other elements, so that other elements are not co-
ordinate, but mere infusions into a whole which is
already in being." That this is true, the testimony
can be cited of witnesses who cannot be gainsaid.

1 E. A. Freeman : Four Oxford Lectures, 1887, p. 80.

314 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Said Matthew Arnold in the Nineteenth Century, in
one of his latest papers : —

" I have long accustomed myself to regard the people
of the United States as just the same people with our-
of Matthew sclyes, — as simply the English on the other
Arnold. side of the Atlantic. The ethnology of

that American diplomatist who, the other day, assured
a Berlin audience that the great admixture of Ger-
man had now made the people of the United States
as much German as English, has not yet prevailed
with me. I adhere to my old persuasion ; the Amer-
icans are English people on the other side of the
Atlantic."

Says another gifted Englishman, R. A. Proctor,
whom also the world has lately lost, in one of his last
Of E A utterances : ^ " Most Englishmen and nearly

Proctor. all Americans take an entirely wrong view

of the kinship of the two races. They seem to look
upon it as something remote, where in reality (as sci-
ence views it, and as common sense should view it)
it is so close that the biologist regards it almost as
identity. They speak of Britain as the mother-country,
where in reality Americans are as yet but a commu-
nity of Europeans, chiefly Britons, who have as but
yesterday occupied their new home ; they can no more
be regarded as a distinct race than the sparrows who
just now so plague the American farmer are to be
regarded as a distinct family from the twitterers in
our London streets. ... I might as reasonably look
upon my fellow-countrymen on the other side of the
Atlantic as of a different race, because I happen to
have lived a few years in America, as the American

1 In the Louisville " Courier-Journal," the Chicago " Inter-Ooean, " etc.

FUTURE OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 315

of to-day regard his cousins in the old home as
another people, because a short time ago (yesterday
in race-history) some few came out from Britain here,
and many have since followed them. ... I have had
better opportunities than most men of comparing the
two nations; and I profess I find the difference
between them even less than I should have expected
from the difference in the conditions under which the
two nations have subsisted during the last few genera-
tions. What I supposed, in the incompleteness of my
first few years' information, to indicate characteristic
differences, I have found to be no more characteristic
(in the national sense) than the differences I find in
the ways of my friends, the Smiths, who live in the
country; in those of my friends, the Browns, who
live by the river-side ; and to those other friends of
mine, the Robinsons, who pass the greater part of
their time in London. ... If there is life in the good
old English blood still, it is good for America, since
it is thence the life of the American race came. If
Americans have in th,em the will and power to thrive,
it looks well for their English kindred, since they are
of the same blood. Great Britain and America have
diverse futures — even though the old country may
be able to shake off the dead-weight which the new
country left behind it. But it is sure and certain
truth that mutual insults imply common faults, while
mutual esteem indicates that each nation respects
itself and has faith in its own great future."

Still more significant than these declarations are
the words of Brj'ce : " Any one can see how severe a
strain is put on democratic institutions by of james
the influx every year of half a million of ^''^™'

316 AlSTGLO-SAXOlsr FKEEDOM.

untrained Europeans, not to speak of those French
Canadians who now settle in the northeastern States.
Being in most States admitted to full civic rights
before they have come to shake off European notions
and habits, these strangers enjoy political power
before they either share or are amenable to Ameri-
can opinion. Such immigrants are at first not merely
a dead-weight in the ship, but a weight which party
managers can, in city polities, so shift as to go near
upsetting her. They follow blindly leaders of their
own race, are not moved by discussion, exercise no
judgment of their own. This lasts for some years,
probably for the rest of life with those who are eld-
erly when they arrive. But the younger sort, when,
if they be foreigners, they have learned English, —
when, working among Americans, they have im-
bibed the sentiments and assimilated the ideas of
the country, — are thenceforth scarcely to be distin-
guished from the native population. They are more
American than the Americans in their desire to put
on the character of their new country. The peculiar
gift which the republic possesses of quickly dissolv-
ing and assimilating the foreign bodies that are
poured into her mass, imparting to them her own
qualities of orderliness, good sense, self-restraint, a
willingness to bow to the will of the majority, is
mainly due to the all-pervading force of opinion,
which the new-comer, so soon as he has formed social
and business relations with the natives, breathes in
daily till it insensibly transmutes him. Their faith,
and a sentiment of resentment against England, keep
up among the Irish a body of separate opinion, which
for a time resists the solvent power of its Ameriea,n,

FUTURE OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 317

environment. But the public schools finish "the
work of the factory and the newspapers. The Irish
immigrant's son is an American citizen for all other
purposes, even if he retain, which he seldom does,
the hereditary anglophobia.^ . . . Recent immi-
grants have as yet affected American society but
little, save that the Germans have brought in a
greater fondness for music, for the drama, and for
out-of-door life in the cities. I greatly doubt whether
the influence of the immigrants will be much more
powerful in the future, so strong is the native type
of thought and customs, and so quickly does it tell
on the new-comers." ^

Here, finally, is the testimony of an elevated and
brilliant mind. The chief impression of Sir Edwin
Arnold, the poet of the "Light of Asia" of sir Edwin
and editor of the London Telegraph, when -*^''°''''*-
in America, was "of the absolute practical identity
of manner, mind, and national life between our two
countries." Said he : —

" I have found myself everywhere in a transatlantic
England. I do not say that in any foolish idea that
to be ' quite English ' is a point of perfection. You
may just as well remark that we resemble you ; but
there the fact is that bygone writers must have exag-
gerated most absurdly the supposed distinctive Amer-
ican traits, or else that you have ceased to exhibit
them ; for I have asked myself a hundred times, wan-
dering in your streets and journeying on your rail-
ways, ' Am I really in the New World, or dreaming of
it in the old one ? ' Half an American as I am, by
marriage and by sympathies, I must confess that it

1 American Commonwealth, 11, p. 328. ^ ibid., p. 678, note.

318 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

has been wliolly delightful to observe this unmistak-
able and minute identification of the races, and it fills
me with hope that whatever other nations may quar-
rel and come into armed conflict, America and Eng-
land — vainly divided by the ocean — will by and by
establish an international tribunal composed of the
worthiest and best-trusted men on either side, and
will refer to their judgment under the laws of right
and reason — • without appeal — every question which
threatens to disturb the natural alliance that, in my
opinion, furnishes the very best hope of mankind." ^
Immigrants, says Mr. Bryce, have been speedily
assimilated: so it has been throughout our history.
The Anglo-Saxon stock has been made rich and
strong by a score of crossings with the most vigorous
and intellectual of modern races, but it remains,
nevertheless, Anglo-Saxon. In 1886, at
EngiiBh-° the great Colonial Exhibition in London,
as illustrated what cspeciallv struck the American vis-

at the Colonial . , . , . . , , .

Exhibition of itor was the idcutitv With his own civiliza-

1886. . .,..,..

tion of the civilization represented in the
products set forth ; and the similarity to himself of
the English-speaking men who had gathered there,
though they came from the farthest corners of the
world. Such clothing we wear; in such cars and
coaches we ride ; with such appliances we, too, mine,
work the soil, sail the sea, make music, and teach
the young idea how to shoot; in the paintings of
towns at the antipodes, which sometimes were hung
on the walls, the streets looked like those of any

1 Unlike the authorities that have been cited, Sir Charles Dilke finds
the differences considerable between the populations of the United
States and the British empire. Problems of Greater Britain, pp. 90, 696.

FUTXJEE OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 319

American town ; the frontiersman's hut in the remote
clearing, as the model showed it, was a reproduction
of the log-cabin of Dakota or Kansas. If the Amer-
ican fell into talk with a group pausing in an aisle
before some attractive object, though one might be
from New Zealand, another from the Falkland Islands,
a third from Natal, and a fourth from Athabasca, a
close spiritual and intellectual relationship was at
once developed. All had read to a large extent the
same books, been trained in the same religious faith,
disciplined and made strongly virile by that priceless
polity, so free and yet so carefully ordered, which
had been inherited from Anglo-Saxon ancestors, or
thoroughly assimilated through contact with Eng-
lishmen.

" Should you know," said the American, " that my
home is in the valley of the Mississippi ? "

" By no means," was the reply ; " you seem to me
like my neighbors in Auckland."

And yet it was two hundred and fifty years since
the ancestor of the American had left his home in
Kent to go to the New World, and the New Zealander
had never left his island until he took ship a month
before for London. " You seem like my neighbors,"
also could say the man from Cape Town, from Fort
Garry, from Puget Sound, from the gold fields of
Ballarat. " You might all come from this or that
English county," said a Londoner who had joined
the group; "you are no more diverse from one
another, or from us, than the man of Yorkshire from
the man of Dorset, — the Cumberland shepherd from
the Leicestershire farmer." Marvellous, indeed, was
the display of resources in the Colonial Exhibition ;

320 ANGLO-SAXOJSr FREEDOM.

profound was the impression received of the vastness
of the empire of England, and of the productiveness
of the territories scattered so widely in every zone.
Dots of islands, of which one had scarcely heard, had
each its nook, filled with sugar-cane, palm-leaves,
feathers of the bird-of-paradise ; or with tasselled
maize and the tanned hides of mighty oxen ; or again
with sealskins, the tusks of the walrus, and snow-
shoes bound together with the sinews of the rein-
deer, — according as the situation of the islet was
under a torrid, a temperate, or an arctic sim. At the
same time, in spacious apartments or far-stretching
halls, the larger dependencies made each a majestic
showing of results, when lands endowed with fertil-
ity, stretching under favorable heavens, respond with
products overflowing in abundance to the cherishing
of civilized men. Full of interest, however, though
the display of material wealth was, a far deeper inter-
est lay in the fact that these men, so widely sundered
in all the four quarters of the earth, were flesh of
one another's flesh, and bone of one another's bone,
speaking one tongue, disciplined by the same agencies,
judging by the same standards, aspiring to the same
ideals. Substantially, they were identical with one
another, — identical, too, with the American, — all
with blood enriched by infusion from scores of the
choicest races, but not changed in frame or speech or
soul from the champions who, under Alfred, or Earl
Simon, or Cromwell, or Washington, or Lincoln,
fought to sustain Anglo-Saxon freedom.

Not only does the English-speaking race remain
substantially one, but it has never been stronger or
better than at the present hour. The stock that has

FUTURE OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 321

colonized so widely, that rules witli so little discord
the two hundred and fifty millions of Tj^ggjock
India, that fought through in America "rbetterThan
those dreadful four years of civil war, — °°"^'
the stock which, in spite of its rapacity and self-seek-
ing, has furnished such types, of fortitude, steadfast-
ness, consecration of high powers to noble ends, as
Livingstone, Stanley, Gordon who died at Khartoum,
John Bright, Abraham Lincoln, — as to such a stock
it may well be said that it has undergone no degen-
eracy, even though we compare it with the men of
'76, the generation of the Pilgrim Fathers, the Eng-
lishmen of the day of Elizabeth, or those who fol-
lowed Henry V to the field of Agincourt.

"Whatever strength and virtue the English-speaking
man of to-day can summon up, he undoubtedly needs.
No age has been without its lowering
dangers, and perplexities apparently inex- rassmentg
tricable ; probably no age will ever be
without them. In the gymnasium of human experi-
ence, such lets and bars are the appliances through
exercise with which the souls of men are to be made
strong. Our age has them to so full an extent that
we feel sometimes we are likely to be crushed. Cer-
tain embarrassments are common to us and to the
whole civilized world ; as, for instance, the co„,„,o^
troubles arising from the unsatisfactory re- "^ans^™-
lations between labor and capital, from plutocracy,
from overgrown corporations, from the encroachments
of ecclesiastical power in directions quite beyond its
proper domain, from intemperance, from licentious-
ness, from selfishness of a thousand kinds.

Other occasions for anxiety are peculiar. Canada

322 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

asks what is to be done with the French of Quebec ?
„ , . , Australia feels that she sits beneath the

Uolonial em-

barraBsmentB. ghadow of a constaut peril from the four
hundred million Chinese, who, no longer cherishing
isolation, have become enterprising and aggressive,
and, if unopposed, are quite able and quite willing to
overspread her lands with a flood that would make
them Mongolian rather than Anglo-Saxon. England
is full of agitation over the Irish question. " Let Ire-
Embarrass- land be satisfied with her present relations
i"nd.* " °^' to us," say the Unionists ; " with an ample
representation at Westminster, with complete toler-
ance of Catholicism, with every avenue thrown open
so that no bar exists in the Church, Army, Navy, or
anywhere to prevent an Irishman from reaching the
highest positions, with Anglicanism disestablished
upon her soil, and the best will on our part to put an
end to all abuses, which we confess with shame have
existed in centuries that have passed; — when so
much has been done, and the disposition exists to
do so much more, why cannot Ireland be satisfied
with the present bond ? " On the other hand arises
the Irish clamor for practical independence ; while
radicals of a less extreme type exclaim : " Let us
give Ireland local self-government; let her have a
Parliament of her own for her own affairs, and
be connected with us by a tie similar to that
which connects a State with the Federal Union,
in America. If it follows from this as a necessary
consequence that Scotland and Wales must also have
local independence, and each its own legislature,
so let it be ; the time demands a certain reconstruc-
tion of the British empire. No important thing

FUTURE OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 323

would be sacrificed, and a hundred important things
would be gained, with the coming to pass of Imperial
Federation. Let not only Ireland, Scotland, and
Wales stand locally independent, but also Canada,
New Zealand, and Australia ; and let the Parliament
at Westminster become a congress competent to deal
with imperial questions only,, each matter of limited
interest being remanded to the assembly of the
district concerned in its settlement." In such a
readjustment of the British polity, say the Home
Rulers, nothing of moment would be sacrificed ; every
time-honored heirloom of the constitution might be
thoroughly preserved. The monarchy can stand;
perhaps even the House of Lords, though this is more
uncertain; nor need disestablishment of necessity
follow. Simply the empire would be reconstructed
after a fashion which would adapt it to the present
situation and to present ideas, — all so widely differ-
ent from the situations and the ideas of the times
which have preceded ours.

America is no less beset with questions of difficulty
peculiar to herself. What does justice to the negro
demand, and how shall it be secured to

T ., T . . . Of America,

him, while at the same time our institu-
tions are held safe, — institutions which presuppose as
a first condition of their existence that an intelligent
people shall administer them? Can the civil service
be reformed, and legislatures, State and Federal, be
redeemed from corruption and inefiiciency? What
safeguards can be thrown about the public schools,
indispensable cradles of good citizenship, institutions
of fundamental importance, at no time in our history
too zealously cherished, and at the present hour boldly

324 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

attacked by the power which so often has been the
most formidable foe of freedom? What dikes can
be erected against the undesirable foreign flood,
which, pouring in yearly in volume always increasing
through the unobstructed sluices of our seaports,
seems likely so far to dilute our blood as to make it
unequal to the task of .sustaining Anglo-Saxon free-
dom ? Said Lowell once : " I remember a good many
years ago, M. Guizot asked me how long I thought
the American Republic was going to last. Said I,
'M. Guizot, it will last just as long as the traditions
of the men of English descent who founded it are
dominant there.' And he assented. And that is my
firm faith." Can we be quite sure that the traditions
of the men of English descent will remain dominant?
Mr. Bryce, in a passage already quoted, speaks confi-
dently of the vast assimilating power possessed by
the American people, and makes light of anticipation
of evils to arise from an overtaxing of that power.
Perhaps he is too confident. Who can help being
daunted before present facts? An American minis-
ter to a foreign court declares in Berlin without con-
tradiction that the ideas of Germany have displaced
those of the Anglo-Saxon world in America ! ^ A
Philadelphia journalist thinks a trip from the sear
board to the Mississippi enough to disabuse one of
the idea that this is an Anglo-Saxon nation.^ An
intelligent American citizen of foreign birth claims
also that our whole civilization is at present German, .
rather than English. " The republican spirit is
German rather than English. The German peasants

1 Matthew Arnold's story; see p. 314.

2 " Philadelphia American," December 8, 1888.

FUTURE OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM. 325

in 1525 fought for every principle that it was the
fortune of England to realize much later. The
English- Americans may go. The republic will last." ^
Men among us whose words have some weight speak
thus lightly of a decay of Anglo-Saxon strength in
America. Meantime, the flood ever rises: through
the sluices pour currents from a score of peoples, the
stream often noisome through ignorance and vice.
No fact is better established than that strains of men,
as of the lower animals, are improved by crossing.
To breed in and in produces degeneration. New
blood, provided it comes from sources not too remote,
and is without morbid taint, invigorates. New blood
is to be welcomed, and yet it should not be infused
to so large an extent as to make of the strain a
different thing. Anglo-Saxon we ought to remain, if
Anglo-Saxon freedom is to be maintained. " It is
part of the inexorable logic of fact and nature, that
you cannot have the growth of the living creature,
plant, animal, man, nation, seriously injured in the
growing time and then set right in subsequent years.
The stunted tree, the starved child, the crushed and
spirit-broken nation, bear the marks of their injury
to the end." 2 As regards political freedom, every
people but the Anglo-Saxons has been at some time
crushed and become spirit-broken. To Anglo-Saxons
alone can our American freedom be safely intrusted.
Invigorate the stock as you please with blood from
Scandinavian, German, Irish, French, Russian, —
from whatever good source, — but let it remain Anglo-

1 Private letter to the author, from a " foreign-born United States
citizen."

2 Peter Bayne : Chief Actors of the Puritan Revolution, pp. 71, 72.

826 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Saxon still. "Our American Republic will endure
just as long as the traditions of the men of English
descent who founded it are dominant there," and no
longer.

It is not probable that the difficulties which beset
civilized men at the present day are extraordinarily
Embarrass- scrious ; indeed, it is quite certain that our
"lordinarHy" troublcs are Small as compared with those
serious. \(rith which, in the past, civilization has

repeatedly been threatened. They are, however, suf-
ficiently serious, and among civilized men to-day the
English-speaking race has its full share of embarrass-
ments. In a cursory way, some of these embarrass-
ments have been indicated : it is no part of the purpose
of this book to show how they must be met. The
problems of the time are abundantly discussed. Let
us only discuss here the matter whether our race, so
numerous, so strong, so resourceful, is also in other
respects so circumstanced as to be likely to wage a
winning war. Let us ask two questions : 1. Does
the English-speaking race respect and love the free-
dom which it has inherited ? 2. Has the race within
itself any proper feeling of brotherhood? Do its
members stand ready to join hands, believing that in
union there is strength ? Only if these questions can
be answered in the affirmative can Anglo-Saxon free-
dom be certain of permanence.

DO WE RESPECT OUR FREEDOM? 327

CHAPTER XIX.

DO WE RESPECT QUE FREEDOM?

First. Do we respect the freedom which we have
inherited ?

On the 30th of April, 1889, the writer, in a great
city Ijdng in the border-land between North and South,
watched the passing of a vast procession. ^[.1,^ eejebra-
Thus the people had chosen, upon the cen- go^gsg-^^"'
tenary of the inauguration of Washington
and of the going into operation of the Federal Con-
stitution, to do honor to our chief hero, and to the
ordered Anglo-Saxon freedom which he fought to
sustain. It was a city which at the time of the cele-
bration was, and for many years before had been, a
house divided against itself. Sharp race-conflicts
between black and white, bitter religious feuds, dis-
cord between capitalist and laborer, between the
drinker and prohibitionist, between Northerner and
Southerner, — quarrels of many kinds proceeding
sometimes beyond recrimination to bloodshed, — had
for years found in that city an arena. On that day,
however, was presented a remarkable spectacle of har-
mony. Over each division of the marching column,
everywhere from house-tops and windows, waved the
stars and stripes. A division of schoolboys followed
a division of gray-beards. Catholic and Protestant
stepped for once to the same music; so, too, the
Knights of St. Patrick and the Society of St. George ;

328 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the negro and the master whose authority the Civil
War had broken ; Bohemians and Hungarians with a
noisome flavor of anarchy in their somewhat sullen
lines, and the solid representatives of the mart and
of the bank; Confederate veterans and the Grand
Army of the Republic. For the moment all was
harmony ; disputes were hushed ; the " plain people "
was at one as regarded paying honor to the great
instrument upon which our polity rests, and the great
soldier and magistrate who was its main establisher
and upholder, — at one in respect for our Anglo-
Saxon freedom.

There can be no doubt that in England, too, the
"plain people," however much reluctance the privi-
The people's kgcd class might show, would be equally
s^xaatfei^°' harmonious, if similar occasion were given ;
'*°°'' nor can there be any doubt as regards the

universal zeal for democratic freedom of each great
English dependency .1 Nor is it the " plain people "
alone who stand strongly for democracy. However
it may be here and there eyed askance, and its
inevitable progress toward supreme power regarded
as a calamity, it is not the sentiment of the scholars
and thinkers best worth following. Andrew Car-
view of An- negie, a generous representative of capital,
drew Came- gigpifigg "Triumphant Democracy"; but
there are voices better worth heeding than that of
the fluent, quick-minded Scotch iron-master, that
have spoken strongly, in well-weighed words, their
faith. Says J. Toulmin Smith,^ treating of the kind

1 See Dilke on this point, Problems of Greater Britain, p. 490.

2 Local Sell-Government and Centralization. London, J. Chapman,
1851, p. 40.

DO WE RESPECT OUR FREEDOM? 329

of sense most useful in state affairs, with a confidence
whicli many will think excessive : —

"It is well worthy of remark that it is not the
mass of the folk and people who are insensible to
sound argument and reason. This is a ^^ j ^^y,
charge often made by those who imagine ™'° ^"'"'•
themselves superior to their neighbors. The truth
is, however, that the most really ignorant classes,
and the most incapable of comprehending sound
argument and reason, are often found to be those
who are commonly called the educated classes. The
cause of this is very simple. What is now called
'education,' and what many are anxious to enforce
by a national system, is nothing but putting a certain
artificial mould upon the mind, which, instead of
developing its powers, does but serve to wrap it in
prejudices and bind it to conventionalisms. The
artisan classes, at least equally called upon by external
circumstances to exercise the native powers of mind,
have fewer prejudices to block the way to the sober
entertainment of argument and reason. . . .

" For Anglo-Saxon freedom, we must have, indeed,
educated men, but it is not reading and writing,
science and arts, that ever did or ever can make the
educated man. Engrossing the attention with these
may indeed be made the most effective means of pre-
venting the man from becoming truly educated. Of
this, Prussia offers a striking example : with a nominal
education, a state education of great elaborateness,
the result is, as it was intended to be, a people incap-
able of dealing with their own wants and conditions,
and submitting to be dealt with as herds of animals,
who exist only for the behoof of kings. An observ-

330 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

ant and thoughtful writer, speaking of the Prussian
system, so ignorantly held up as a system to be
adopted in this country, well describes that people,
as being the most superintended, the most interfered
with, the most destitute of civil freedom and political
rights, — in a word, the most enslaved people in
Western Europe ; and the most educated, that is in
what is conventionally called education, — the drill-
ing of the mind, not its development. This testi-
mony is confirmed by all who thoroughly, and not
merely superficially, have understood and watched
the system, and who have not been deluded by mean-
ingless statistics of schools." ^

Shall we accept this without qualification ? Forty
years have passed since the words just quoted were
written. Much history has been made by Prassia in
the intei-vening time. Under able leaders she has
shown herself marvellously powerful. As regards
the people, however, what the world has had occasion
to notice particularly is the docility with which they
have suffered themselves to be led. The initiative
has been from the ruling dynasty and its great ser-
vants. The Court has supplied the plan of action,
the brains and the energy for carrying it out, using
the resources and mighty strength of an unresisting
people to secure objects undoubtedly adapted to pro-
mote the well-being of the people (who can doubt
the blessing coming to the Germans from a united
Germany ?) ; nevertheless, objects whose value the
people did not at all appreciate till they were gained,
and which they were quite incompetent to secure if
they had appreciated them. It has been said that

1 Local Self-Government and Centralization, p. 321.

DO WE RESPECT OUR FREEDOM? 331

the Germans of to-day are cheated by a mere coun-
terfeit of representative institutions, while real
freedom is far away from them. To some extent
the remark is true. Though the German Parliament
debates and votes, the power of the dynasty is very
great, and not diminishing. Docility is still the most
marked characteristic of the German nation, as it
was in the time some decades since, when Matthew
Arnold spoke of theii" " Corporalism," their obsequi-
ousness before those in authority, a trait resembling
the obsequiousness of the subaltern before his superior
officer, a quality which Matthew Arnold found marked
in a man even so supreme as Goethe. Nowhere at
the same time is " education " so elaborate and so all-
embracing. Not a youth or maiden can escape the
inevitable drill. That in a thousand ways the drill
is valuable, who will doubt ? There is, however, a
discipline gained at the bench, the forge, and the
counter, — in the wrestle of affairs, — more than all
a discipline gained in the perfectly unfettered dis-
cussion and action of a free people. As a qualifica-
tion for citizenship in a really free land, it cannot be
doubted that the discipline of business and political
activity is superior to that of the schools, — that
the plain carpenter, blacksmith, and shopkeeper, with
wits keen from their bread-winning, and also from
the argument at the corner, in the store, — alas ! also
in the saloon, — can judge about a multitude of public
questions as well as, or better than, the man trained
in books only.

This point is so interesting, it is well worth while
to dwell upon it more at length. As re-
gards the progress of freedom, the history

332 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

of men well placed and highly cultivated is often
a discreditable one. Bryce notes the apparent par-
adox, that where the humbler classes have differed
from the higher, they have often been proved by the
event to have been right, and their so-called betters
wrong. Many European countries have illustrated
this during the last fifty years. A respectable minor-
ity of the educated English, to be sure, sympathized
with the national movement in Italy, but far more
workingmen. In the American Civil War, the work-
ing classes stood for the North; a majority of the
so-called educated for the South. In America, abo-
lition had more friends among the less educated than
among the best educated. The historical and scien-
tific data, continues the critic, on which the solution
of a difficult problem depends, are as little known to
the wealthy as to the poor. Ordinary education,
even of a university, does not fit a man to deal with
these questions, and sometimes fills him with a vain
conceit of his own competence which closes his mind
to argument and evidence. Nearly all great political
and social causes have first made their way among
the middle and humbler classes. The initiative pro-
ceeds from certain individuals, lofty and piercing
minds ; these are followed by the masses, while the
higher classes frown and persecute. Of this course
of things, Christianity is the most striking instance.^
Elsewhere ^ Bryce makes reference to the descrip-
tion of Plato, in which " the mules and asses of
democracy are made to prance along the roads,
scarcely deigning to bear their burdens. Tlie passion
for unrestrained license, for novelty, for variety, is

1 American Commonwealth, II, p. 213, etc. ^ Jbid., p. 614.

DO WE RESPECT OUR FREEDOM? 333

to liiiii the note of democracy." This view Biyce
compares with that of such modern critics of de-
mocracy as Sir Henry Maine, who apprehend that
monotony and even obstinate conservatism are the
faults to which democracy is liable. Each theory, he
sums up, is plausible in the abstract, and each equally
wide of the facts ; for democracy under proper con-
ditions is quite able to follow the reasonable mean.

Said Gladstone at Oxford in 1878 : " I trace in the
education of Oxford of my own time one great
defect. Perhaps it is my own fault ; but I must
admit that I never learned at Oxford that which I
have learned since; namely, to set a due value on
the inestimable principle of human liberty. The
temper which too much prevailed in learned and
academical ranks was to regard with jealousy and
fear the principles of liberty." ^

And another able Englishman, Lecky, declares ^
that the influence of the English universities, repre-
senting especially, of course, the cultivated,
has been almost uniformly hostile to polit-
ical progress. Opinions formed in drawing-room and
study should, he says, have contact with that shrewd
middle-class intellect which judges questions with
broader sympathies often, and on higher issues. In
politics the evils springing from monopoly are some-
times greater than those springing from incompe-
tence. Little is to be gained by placing political
power exclusively in the hands of a small restricted
class, even where it is the most enlightened class.

1 Quoted in Loudon " Spectator," January 4, 1890, article " Glad-
stone's Birthday."

2 History of the Eighteenth Century, III, p. 233, etc.

334 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Class bias often does more to distort than education
to expand the intellect. Rectitude is by no means
always proportioned to intellectual development.
A small wealthy class will be much less quickly and
seriously injured by misgovernment than the great
industrial community; it may, indeed, be benefited
by a policy which is very injurious to the country at
large. In the eighteenth century in England, a
small class had a monopoly of power, meanwhile
shamefully neglecting the education, sanitary con-
dition, and general well-being of the masses of the
nation, who sank far toward utter ignorance and
lawlessness. The following quotation from Addison's
" Remarks on Italy," introduced by Lecky, in the
course of his discussion, has much interest : —

" One may generally observe that the body of a
people has juster views for the public good, and pur-
sues them with greater uprightness, than

Of Addison. ° / °

the nobility and gentry, who have so many
private expectations and particular interests which
hang like a false bias upon their judgments, and may
possibly dispose them to sacrifice the good of their
country to the advancement of their own fortunes;
whereas the gross of the people can have no other
prospect in changes and revolutions than of public
blessings, that are to diffuse themselves through the
whole state in general."

If Englishmen belonging to the highly favored and
cultivated class can give such good reasons for popu-
lar government, it is to be expected certainly that
Americans of corresponding position should furnish
examples of writers maintaining emphatically the
same view. No doubt there are among cultivated

DO WE RESPECT OUK FREEDOM? 335

and well-to-do Americans many, fastidious until they
become finical, wlio shrink from the turmoil of a
democracy, and would willingly, if they could, limit
political power to those having " a stake in the coun-
try," or standing on a high level of education.
Among the best and wisest, however, there is no dis-
like of the plain people, and no desire that power
should be anywhere else than in their hands. No
American has come nearer to being born and bred in
the purple than John Lothrop Motley;
and his life, after reaching manhood, was
largely passed at courts, — St. Petersburg, Vienna,
Berlin, Dresden, the Hague, and London, — in which
he was always a prime favorite of princes and nobles,
and beheld always the most favorable side of the sys-
tems which they sustained. Yet Abraham Lincoln
himself was not more sturdily democratic than
Motley.

He writes : ^ " I don't think there is any danger of
my losing my American feelings, and my republican
tastes. ... I have a sincere belief that a Brobdig-
nag people like ours is the most gigantic phenomenon
that traveller or philosopher has ever seen or imag-
ined, and that it is because the giant is so big and
so near and grows so fast, and feels his bigness so
much more and more every day, that one sees the
superficial defects of his complexion and the warts
on his nose. ... I am most sincere when I say
that I should never wish America to be Anglicized
in the aristocratic sense. ... I feel too keenly what
a fearful price is paid by the English people in order
that this splendid aristocracy, with their parks and

1 To his wife, Letters, II, p. 294.

336 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

castles and shootings and fishings and fox-huntings,
their stately and unlimited hospitality, their lettered
ease and learned leisure, may grow fat, ever to be in
danger of finding my judgment corrupted by it."

Again he writes : ^ —

" For one, I like democracy. I don't say that it is
pretty or genteel or jolly; but it has a reason for
existing, and is a fact in America, and is founded on
the inimitable principle of reason and justice. Aris-
tocracy certainly presents more brilliant social phe-
nomena, more luxurious social enjoyments. Such a
system is very cheerful for a few thousand select
specimens out of the few hundred millions of the
human race. It has been my lot and yours to see
how much splendor, how much intellectual and
physical refinement, how much enjoyment of the
highest character has been created by the English
aristocracy ; but what a price is paid for it ! Think
of a human being working all day long, from six in
the morning to seven at night, for fifteen or twenty
kreutzers a day, in Moravia or Bohemia, Ireland or
Yorkshire, for forty or fifty years, to die in the work-
house at last. Tliis is the lot of the great majority
all over Europe ; and yet they are of the same flesh
and blood, the natural equals in every way of the
Howards and Stanleys, Esterhazys and Lichten-
steins."

More detailed and emphatic than the testimony of
the great historians just quoted is that of President
Eliot, of Harvard College,^ also a Boston Brahmin

1 To his eldest daughter, November 23, 1864, Letters, II, pp. 192, 193.

2 " The Working of the American Democracy." Plii Beta Kappa
oration at Cambridge, June 28, 1888.

DO WE RESPECT OUR FREEDOM? 337

of tlie highest caste (according to Dr. Holmes'
well-known ranking), the heir of the care-
ful culture of many generations, himself snot, of
carefully trained and refined, and through
position and ability among the chief of American edu-
cators. Dismissing the experience which Europe has
had of democracy as entitled to little weight, when we
are forming judgments, he declares that satisfactory
evidence concerning the practical working of demo-
cratic institutions can be gained only from the United
States. Only there, has " a well-rooted democracy
on a great scale ever existed."

" The first question I wish to deal with is a funda-
mental one : How wisely, and by what process, has
the American people made up its mind upon public
questions of supreme difficulty and importance ? Not
how will it, or how might it, make up its mind ; but
how has it made up its mind.' It is commonly said
that the multitude, being ignorant and untrained,
cannot reach so wise a conclusion upon questions of
state as the cultivated few; that the wisdom of a
mass of men can only be an average wisdom at the
best; and that democracy, which in things material
levels up, in things intellectual and moral, levels
down. Even De Tocqueville says that there is a
middling standard of knowledge in a democracy, to
which some rise and others descend. Let us put
these speculative opinions, which have so plausible a
sound, in contrast with American facts.

"The people of this country have had three su-
preme questions to settle within the last hundred
and thirty years : first, the question of independence
of Great Britain ; secondly, the question of forming a

338 • ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

firm federal union ; and thirdly, the question of main-
taining that union at whatever cost of blood and
treasure. In the decision of these questions, four
generations of men took active part. The first two
questions were settled by a population mainly Eng-
lish; but when the third was decided, the foreign
admixture was already considerable. That graver or
more far-reaching political problems could be pre-
sented to any people, it is impossible to imagine.
Everybody can now see that in each case the only
wise decision was arrived at by the multitude, in
spite of difficulties and dangers which many contem-
porary statesmen and publicists of our own and other
lands thought insuperable. It is quite the fashion to
laud to the skies the second of these three great
achievements of the American democracy; but the
creation of the Federal Union, regarded as a wise
determination of a multitude of voters, was certainly
not more remarkable than the other two. No govern-
ment, — tyranny or oligarchy, despotic or constitu-
tional, — could possibly have made wiser decisions or
executed them more resolutely, as the event has
proved in each of the three cases mentioned.

" In all three of the great popular decisions under
consideration, most remarkable discernment, patience,
and resolution were, as a fact, displayed. If these
were the average qualities of the many, then the
average mental and moral powers of the multitude
suffice for the greatest deeds ; if they were the quali-
ties of the superior few infused into the many by
speech and press, by exhortation, example, and
leadership, even then the assertion that the operative
opinions of the unlearned mass on questions of state

DO WE RESPECT OUR FREEDOM? 339

must necessarily be foolisli, their honesty only an
ordinary honesty, and their sentiments vulgar, falls
to the ground. The multitude, it would seem, either
can distil essential wisdom from a seething mass of
heterogeneous evidence and opinion; or can be in-
spired, like a single individual, from without and
above itself. If the practical wisdom of the multitude
inaction be attributed to the management or to the
influence of a sagacious few, the wise result proves
that these leaders were well chosen by some process
of natural selection, instead of being designated, as
in an oligarchy, by the inheritance of artificial privi-
leges. . .

" There is a limited sense in which it is true that in
the United States the average man predominates ; but
the political ideas which have predominated in the
United States, and therefore in the mind and will of
the average man, — equality before the law, national
independence, federation, and indissoluble union, —
are ideas not of average, but of superlative merit. It
is also true that the common school and the news-
paper echo received opinion, and harp on moral
commonplaces. But unfortunately there are many
accepted humane opinions and ethical commonplaces
which have never yet been embodied in national
legislation, — much less in international law, — and
which may therefore still be repeated to some advan-
tage. If that comprehensive commonplace, ' Ye are
all members one of another,' could be realized in
international relations, there would be an end of war
and industrial isolation."

President Eliot enumerates four forms of mental
and moral activity, of the highest usefulness : first.

340 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

that which maintains political vitality throughout the
Federal Union ; second, that which supports unsub-
sidized religious institutions ; third, that which devel-
ops the higher instruction in the arts and sciences and
trains men for all the professions ; and, fourth, that
which is applied to the service of corporations. All
these forms of activity mark the American democracy.
No disposition appears in the masses to oppress those
better placed. " After observing the facts of a full
century, one may say of the American democracy
that it has contracted public debt with moderation,
paid it with unexampled promptness, acquired as good
a public credit as the world has ever known, made
private property secure, and shown no tendency to
attack riches, or to subsidize property, or in either
direction to violate the fundamental principle of de-
mocracy, that all men are equal before the law. The
significance of these facts is prodigious. They mean
that as regards private property and its security, a
government by the many and for the many is more to
be trusted than any other form of government; and
that as regards public indebtedness, an experienced
democracy is more likely to exhibit just sentiments
and practical good judgment than an oligarchy or a
tyranny."

As to progress and reformation, continues Presi-
dent Eliot, combating here ideas expressed in Sir
Henry Maine's " Popular Government," nowhere else
is religious toleration so thoroughly put in practice as
in the United States; nowhere else has there been
such well-meant and persistent effort to improve the
legal status of women, in behalf of hospitals, asy-
lums, reformatories, and prisons, to apply legislative

DO WE RESPECT OUR FREEDOM? 341

remedies to acknowledged abuses and e\dls. For
promptness in making physical forces and machinery
do the work of men, the people of the United States
incontestably surpass other peoples. The notion that
democracy will hinder religious, political, and social
reformation and progress, or restrain commercial and
industrial improvement, is a chimera. Lastly, says
President Eliot, no other land has succeeded so well in.
producing the gentleman, and that consummate fruit
of society at its best, — the lady. " Since democracy
has every advantage for producing in due season and
proportion the best human types, it is reasonable to
expect that science and literature, music and art, and
all the finer graces of society will develop and thrive
in America, as soon as the more urgent tasks of sub-
duing a wilderness and organizing society upon a
new and untried plan are fairly accomplished." ^

Among English-speaking men, then, is there satis-
faction with the freedom which they have inherited ?
At one end of the social scale there is no (jgn^ai re-
doubt an element which would, if it could, fPfl^giV"™
turn liberty into license, order into an- domam"ng
archy; it is, however, newly arrived, '"s'^aDdiow.

1 In the " Century " magazine for August, 1890, President Eliot fur-
nishes, in an article called "The Forgotten Millions," an interesting
supplement to his Phi Beta Kappa address. To people inclined to be
hysterical over the woes and sins of the present, an age which, what-
ever may he said against it, is the best age which the world has ever
seen, this account of the simple, honorable life of a plain New England
town will afford profitable reading. For, as Mr. Eliot says: "This
sequestered, wholesome, and contented community affords a fair type
of the organization of basal American society. Due allowance made
for difference of climate, soil, diet, and local usage, this is very much
the way in which from thirty to forty millions of the American people
live."

342 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

unassimilated, and we may confidently look forward
to its absorption into the strong and sound Anglo-
Saxon environment. Again, among the well-placed,
as regards means, position, and high education, both
in England and America, are undoubtedly some
who dread democracy, and who would, if they could,
strengthen the hold upon the world of narrowing
institutions which we are fast forsaking. The great
public heart, however, whether we study its pulses
among the masses or among those who by ability,
culture, and place, are the leaders of the world, clings
with love to our forms, upholds them with enthusi-
asm, and anticipates their full triumph with the
highest hope.

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 343

CHAPTER XX.

A PRATEENITY OF ENGLISH-SPEAKING MEN.

Finally, the question is to be answered whether
in the Anglo-Saxon world there is any disposition
toward proper brotherhood. Among the T^gj^^^^f
English-speaking races, thoughtful minds |axon broth-
now and then express the idea that a "^''°^-
closer coming together of the various Anglo-Saxon
bodies, isolated and scattered about the world, is a
thing to be desired. In the British empire, in which
it has come to pass that the great dependencies are
connected with the mother-land by links scarcely
appreciable. Imperial Federation has grown to be a
popular notion. The dream is entertained that all
may become England, — that the distinc-
tion between mother-land and dependency Jeeuy"' '^' ^'
having been quite done away, a great
world- Venice may come into existence, through
which indeed the seas shall flow, — to unite, however,
not to divide ; because the seas are to be the easy
highways through which fellow-citizens may speedily
move in their intercourse with one another.^ A still
broader incorporation into a compact whole than even
this has been thought of, and the idea expressed by
men whom, in their respective communities, all
revere.

1 J. R. Seeley : The Expansion of England.

344 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

John Bright wrote in 1887 to the Committee for
the Celebration of the Centennial of the American
Of John Constitution : " As you advance in the

Bright. second century of your national life, may

we not ask that our two nations may become one
people ? " Sir Henry Partes, one of the foremost
Of Sir Henry statcsmcn of Australia, addressing the
fer'o/ New'"' legislature of New South Wales, November
South Wales. 25, 1887, Said still more definitely: "I
firmly believe it is within the range of human proba-
bility that the great groups of free communities con-
nected with England, wiU, in separate federations,
be united to the mother-country; . . . and I also
believe that in all reasonable probability, by some
less distinct bond, even the United States of America
will be connected with tliis great English-speaking
congeries of free governments. I believe the circum-
stances of the world will develop some such new com-
plex nationality as this, in which each of the parts will
be free and independent while united in one grand
whole, which will civilize the globe." Mr. Goldwin
Of Goldwin Smith,^ though believing a political union
°"' ■ in the highest degree unlikely, says : " I

prize and cherish as of inestimable value to us, all
the moral union of the Anglo-Saxon race. I do not
see why there should not, in the course of time,
be an Anglo-Saxon franchise, including the United
States."

Sir George Grey, at different times governor of an
Australian colony, of New Zealand, and of South
Of Sir George Africa, One of the most illustrious of the
*^"^" men who have developed for England her

' "Macmillan's Magazine," August, 1888.

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 345

great possessions in the South Pacific, contemplates
an eventual, though perhaps far-off league, between
members of the English-speaking race,^ in which the
United States will be not only included, but, dis-
placing England, will become the leader.

Mr. J. C. Firth, a citizen of New Zealand, who has
travelled in America, sees "promise of a coming
brotherhood, which, if wisely fostered, will

' ,•'_,,,', OfJ.C. Firth.

mevitably bind together the English-speak-
ing race all over the world for mutual help, for
mutual blessing. . . . Not until, in the near or
distant future, the Americans take a commanding
position in the coming confederation of the English-
speaking race, can they claim to wear the proud
motto, '■per mare per terrain.^ Not till then will
they hold their proper place by sea and land. . . .
What are all difficulties before the mighty force ex-
isting in common laws, common literature, religion,
love of freedom, common home life, — above all, a
common language ! It needs but a conviction and
establishment of a community of interest to enable
the mighty forces I have described, to work out in
some coming time the confederation of the English-
speaking race all over the world. . . . Should such
a confederation ever be established, and I venture
to think the possession of a common language will
ultimately secure it, one of the greatest safeguards
for the peace of the world, for the welfare of our
common humanity, will have been obtained." ^

The Westminster Review, January, 1889, in an
article entitled " Federation vs. War," expresses
itself as follows : " It has ■ been computed that, in-r

1 Froude; Oceana,- p. 312. 2 Our Kin across the Sea, 1888.

346 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

eluding the population of the United States of
America, some hundred and five millions of people

speak the English language, and belong
minster Re- generally to the Anglo-Saxon race. Now,

supposing that England and the colonies
united in forming an Imperial Parliament, to which
delegates might be sent from each of our dependen-
cies; and suppose the Parliament had for its func-
tion the consideration of imperial interests, leaving
colonial matters to local legislation, it is manifest
that the bond of union between the mother-country
and her dependencies would be drawn much closer
than at present, and greatly to the advantage of all.
In this assembly, Canada, Australia, the South
African Colonies, New Zealand, and the West Indian
Islands would be represented, questions of general
utility would be freely ventilated and fairly dis-
cussed, reciprocal trade regulations would be estab-
lished on a satisfactory basis, and projects for mutual
defence in case of war would be arranged. At
present, the British empire possesses the most ex-
tensive territory and the largest population, together
with the greatest amount of wealth and commerce,
owned by any nation in ancient or modern times.
We monopolize one-third of the world's trade ; more
than one-fifth of the world's population is ruled over
by the Queen of England ; our flag waves over one-
eighth of the habitable globe. In time, and pos-
sibly not a very long time hence, the people of the
United States, numbering at present more than sixty
millions, may form a part of an Anglo-Saxon Con-
federation, which would then be, unquestionably,
the strongest in the world, and which would unite

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 347

the great Anglo-Saxon family by the strongest ties
of any, — those of self-interest. Thus, were the
union we have alluded to formed by England, her
colonies, her Asiatic dependencies, and the United
States of America, the important fact would be estab-
lished that about one-fourth of the human race would
have agreed to settle their disputes by arbitration
instead of by the inhuman and costly process of
war. The question now arises, How would the other
powers of Europe profit by this example ? When
we consider that the weaker nations have every-
thing to lose and nothing to gain by war, yet that
they are obliged to retain, at the cost of heavy taxa-
tion, considerable military forces to resist possible
aggression, it is natural to suppose that they would
be likely to join in a confederation which, to the
extent of their relations with it, would assure them
of immunity from disturbance ; and therefore we
may suppose that one by one the weaker nations will
join the great Anglo-Saxon Union. It would then
remain for four or five of the principal governments
of Europe to consider whether they would keep up
enormous armies at ruinous taxations, with the result
of augmenting public debt and increasing the dis-
content of their subjects, or whether they would
agree to a system which would enable them to dis-
band their armies, lessen taxation, reduce debt, and
banish discontent. It would certainly be a question
for autocrats to consider, but not for them only.
The subjects of the great powers would also express
their opinion, and there is little doubt as to the
form that opinion would take; for, judging by
the present strong tendency of European thought,

348 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

the question -will in some way solve itself at no
distant period."

Such a citation of -opinions, though long, cannot
be uninteresting. It will be noted that the voices
from the British dependencies are especially strong
in favor of an English-speaking bond, and especially
Of the New cordial toward America.^ A conviction is

Zealand Her-
ald, growing, says the New Zealand Herald, of

Auckland, "that one great destiny awaits all the
branches of the English-speaking race, and that in
working out that destiny the Americans and the col-
onists will take a by no means secondary part._ The
brotherhood which will ultimately lead to the rec-
ognition of this unity of mission is now undergoing
a steady development."

The idea of some reconstitution of the family bond
has found expression more often from citizens of
Indifference ^^ British empire than from Americans,
of Americans, ^jigugh men are not wanting in Amer-
ica, in whose minds has arisen the conception of a
doing away with the Anglo-Saxon schism as a thing
possible and to be wished for. The prevailing
mood among us, however, is that of self-sufficiency.
Absorbed with problems and interests that seem
nearer, we let the broad thought go.

If, however, the reader has followed with any sym-
pathy and attention the story told in this book, he
Keasonsia "^iU t)e prepared to see that if we form a

favor of culti- t i i /vii • ■ •

vating f rater- Imk anywhere, our proper ainiiation is
among Bng- witli England, and her children scattered
landsf^" '° east and west. There are, indeed, to-day,

1 For furtlier evidence of tbe cordial feeling of Australia for America, see
" Problems of Greater IBritain," p. 638. See also an article by R. H. Bakewell,
of Nejv Zealand, -" Tlig Loyalty o{ tbe Colonies," in the " Nlaeteentli Century ''
for August, 1890,

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 349

as there were in the time of the American Revolution,
two Englands and two Americas. Of one England,
Lord Dundreary is the type ; as of one America,
the appropriate type is the tuft-hunting daughter of
the plutocrat, who will sell soul and body to get
Lord Dundreary for a husband. There is besides,
the stalwart, manful England for which stand Glad-
stone, John Bright, and James Bryce ; as there are in
America the excellent "plain people," whom Abra-
ham Lincoln loved and trusted. While Miss Moth
flies at her aristocratic luminary, careless of the singe-
ing she may receive, why should not the nobler Eng-
land and the nobler America clasp hands ? The
English admit and have repented humbly of the folly
and injustice by which we were driven to leave them.
Says Thackeray : ^ " The foolish exactions, English read-
petty ignominies, and the habitual inso- an'd°make''TOod
lence of Englishmen toward all foreigners, J""^' mistates.
all colonists, all folk who dare to think their rivers as
good as English rivers; the natural spirit of men
outraged by our injurious domineering spirit, set
Britain and our American colonies to quarrel ; and
the astonishing blunders of the system adopted in
England, brought the quarrel to an issue which I, for
one, am not going to deplore. In less than seven
years after Wolfe's victory, the ignorant tyranny of
England over her American colonies provoked the
great struggle which terminated fifteen years later
in the Declaration of Independence." Such acknowl-
edgments of mistakes are most freely made ; the dis-
position is most earnest to make the mistakes good.
The sound English heart goes out to those who, in

1 In " The Virginians."

360 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

Gladstone's words are "our kin beyond the sea."
Wrote a poet at a time when the two nations seemed
drifting toward war : —

"Men say, Columbia, we shall hear thy guns :
But in what tongue shall be thy battle-cry 1
Not that our sires did love in days gone by,
When all the Pilgrim sires were little sons
In merry homes of England ! Back and see
Thy satchelled ancestor ! Behold, he runs
To mine, and, clasped, they tread the equal lea
To the same yiUage-school, where side by side
They spell ' Our Father ' ! Hard by, the twin pride
Of that gray hall whose ancient oriel gleams
Through yon baronial pines, with looks of light,
Our sister-mothers sit beneath one tree.

Nor force, nor fraud shall hinder us ! Oh, ye
Who, north or south, on east or western land.
Native to noble sounds, say truth for truth,
Freedom for freedom, love for love, and God
For God, — oh, ye who in eternal youth
Speak with a living and creative flood
The universal English, and do stand
Its breathing book, — live worthy of that grand
Heroic utterance ! — parted, yet a whole.
Far, yet unsevered, — children brave and free
Of the great mother-tongue : and ye shall be
Lords of an empire wide as Shakspere's soul.
Sublime as Milton's immemorial theme,
And rich as Chaucer's speech and fair as Shakspere's
dream ! " i

The notion of an Anglo-Saxon brotherhood ought
to have some interest for Americans. The sugges-
sir Edwin ^ion of Sir Edwin Arnold, made to Presi-
f^r°an1nt?ra°- dent Harrisou, was that there should be
tionai council. ^^ international council to arbitrate all

1 Sidney Dobell: Sonnets.

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 351

matters in dispute, from whose decisions there
should be no appeal. Such a scheme would be in
itself a loose kind of federation; and as far as a
formal bond is concerned, without doubt it would
be all that is expedient. As to a union, only one
purely moral is possible or desirable. For some
such clasping of hands, the world is certainly
ripe. Through steam and electricity, time and space
are annihilated. The seas no longer divide, but
unite. Should the will for such fraternity be felt,
there is no power of nature or man which could
interfere to prevent. Had we but the will! "We
nurse too carefully old prejudices ; we remember too
long ancient injuries. We train our children, as we
were trained ourselves, to execrate all things British,
to think only of England's tyranny. Do we not
know that more than half of England were, in the
Revolution, really on our side, regarding our cause
as their own, — and that the descendants of the great
masses who felt with us, prayed for us, and rejoiced
in our success, now hold England in their own
hands ? ^

We have been so over-hospitable in receiving all
comers that we are in some danger of losing our
character as an Anglo-Saxon land. The jreoesBity of
Thirteen Colonies were a fairly homogene- tunit^pve-
ous body, with Celtic and Teutonic admix- s™o^?radi-
tui'es too small to affect appreciably the becomin"
mass about them. With independence, °''"="'''^-
through wide-open doors, America became " the asy-
lum for the oppressed of all nations." With what
result? Twenty-four million of our population are

1 See Chaps. XIV and XVI.

352 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

descended from immigrants since 1790, while twenty-
eight million are from the founders of the land. One
in every six among us is of foreign birth, while one
in every three has both parents of foreign birth. To
such an extent are we overswept, stunned on the one
hand by the Irish cry, weighted in another direction
by inert millions just released from slavery, threat-
ened in still another by an Asiatic flood, penetrated
through and through with a Teutonic and Scandi-
navian inundation which, welcome though it is and
closely allied though it is, cannot undertake our
free life without a process of assimilation, — to such
an extent is America overswept that it is natural
for thoughtful men of the original stock to feel
somewhat insecure, and to ask whether it may not
some day be desirable and feasible to brace them-
selves against a flood which may possibly carry us
quite away from our ancient moorings. Our system
of public education, never too efficient, is in some
quarters threatened with extinction. There are mil-
lions among us into whose minds our great traditions
have never entered, or have entered only to be
mocked at ; while in the case of those of us who are
of Anglo-Saxon blood, these traditions tend to become
obscured and weakened. Precisely here may be found
an important reason for a brotherly drawing toward
those who, in spite of superficial differences, are yet
substantially one with ourselves. As in a battle-line
the electric touch of a comrade's elbow, when a rank
dresses up before a row of hostile, levelled rifles, has
often given new heart to a dispirited, failing soldier,
reviving as by an electric current esprit de corps,
patriotism, the fading recollection of a great cause

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 353

for which arms have been assumed ; so the touch of
the great comrade Anglo-Saxon peoples will bring to
vivid consciousness in all the thought of the impor-
tant things held in common, and a new appreciation
of their value.

Every Anglo-Saxon should hold the leadership of
his race to be something with which is bound up the
welfare of the world. " It is not the result
of accident merely, or of good fortune, thewoHd

•' ° from Anglo-

manifestly, that the English race has been saxon leader-
the only race outside of quiet, cloistered
Switzerland, — the only race standing forward amidst
fierce contests of national rivalries, — that has suc-
ceeded in establishing and maintaining the most lib-
eral forms of government. It is, on the contrary, a
perfectly natural outcome of organic development.
The English alone have approached popular institu-
tions through habit. All other races have rushed
prematurely into them through mere impatience with
habit, — have adopted democracy instead of cultiva-
ting it." 1

The French have possessed political freedom only
since their Revolution ; at the present moment, after
a century of instability, living under a constitution
strange to them, derived from that of Anglo-Saxon
states, and which may fall to pieces at any hour. The
Germans have possessed no proper political freedom
since the days of the migration of the nations, and
are so involved in perils from neighbors east and
west that they dare not give up for it the government
of a strong autocrat. Russia presents a picture of
despotism from which it is scarcely possible to hope

1 Woodrow Wilson In " Polit. Scl. Quar.," March, 1889, p. 169.

354 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

that her people can ever be freed. How plain that
the hopes of a well-ordered liberty in the world are
bound up with the English-speaking race ! What-
ever enthusiasm for it individuals or classes may show,
among Frenchmen, Germans, or Russians, the historic
discipline of those stocks has not been such as to
prepare them to maintain it. These nations have all,
at one time or another, been crushed and spirit-broken.
The Anglo-Saxon, on the other hand, has preserved for
two thousand years the connected tradition of ordered
constitutional freedom. It is flesh of his flesh and bone
of his bone. The strength of the stock — perhaps
it would be more just to say the peculiar circum-
stances of its position — have caused that it alone,
among the great races of the modern world, has pre-
served the primeval liberty which at the outset was
the possession of them all. That liberty is for human
welfare the most precious of possessions, is a prop-
osition which surely need not be argued. Scarcely
less obvious is the proposition that the maintenance
of ordered liberty in the world is bound up with the
leadership of the Anglo-Saxon. Is this leadership in
any way imperilled?

It is no doubt a far-away danger which threatens
Anglo-Saxondom from any foreign power whatever.
Possible perils ^^^ i* ^^ ^°* fooKsh to take thought for
from China, ^^at may possibly sometime come about.
Suppose the four hundred million of China should
come forth to battle for dominion. The Chinese have
of late grown enterprising and shown a disposition
to forsake their home. They thrust themselves un-
comfortably upon Americans, and still more uncom-
fortably upon the Anglo-Saxon nearer to them, in

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 355

tHe South Pacific. Says Sir Henry Parkes: "The
Chinese are a superior set of people, belonging to a
nation of an old and deep-rooted civilization. . . .
It is because I believe the Chinese to be a powerful
race, capable of taking a great hold upon the country,
and because I wish to preserve the type of my own
nation in these fair countries, that I am and always
have been opposed to the influx of Chinese." ^ Un-
questionably the Chinese have been badly treated.
English and Americans deserve to suffer, but for the
sake of civilization, the suffering ought not to go
too far. As we plainly see, at last, the Chinese are
quite capable of showing resentment ; and we can be
certain that with their vast numbers and in many
ways advanced civilization, they are quite capable
of becoming formidable opponents. Mr. Firth, of
New Zealand, says : " The Chinese difficulty is a
direct consequence of the folly or avarice of our
rulers, both in the British empire and the United
States. ... In the interests of English and Ameri-
can commerce, the Chinese emperor was compelled,
by the logic of canon law, to admit foreigners to
reside and trade in certain Chinese ports, similar
treaty rights being granted to Chinese people to re-
side, trade, and work in the United 'States and in the
British dominions." Mr. Firth goes on to say : " No
one had any idea that the Chinese, conservative and
exclusive as they have always been, would ever avail
themselves of this right. How great was the mis-
take ! A vast emigration at once set in to Australia
and California, until there has been danger that large
portions of the United States and Australia might

1 Dilke: Problems of Great Britain, p. 529.

356 ANGLO-SAXON FREKDOM.

be overrun. In the Sandwich Islands, where the
Chinese outnumber the Europeans and Americans,
their bearing has become changed ; they are no longer
inoffensive and obedient. There is a possibility that
the characteristics of Chinatown, in San Francisco,
may appear on a scale vastly enlarged in a hundred
cities, — that Anglo-Saxon lands, indeed, may be-
come little better than Chinese colonies." So writes
this spokesman of the English-speaking world of the
South Pacific, and advises that England and America
limit the annual immigration of Chinese into the
United States and Australia to the numbers of Eng-
lish and Americans entering China as residents, — a
course which would settle the present difficulty with-
out abrogating the treaty.-'

But suppose that China, following her new inspira-
tions, should refuse to be limited ? It is conceivable
that the bland Asiatic, sensible at last of his injuries,
may try to punish, perhaps to overwhelm. An out-
flow from the flowery kingdom is conceivable which
would make prudent an Anglo-Saxon union. Aus-
tralia and New Zealand confront a danger close at
hand, with which to cope unassisted may become a
task quite beyond their power. They may need be-
hind them more even than the power of England,
tied as the hands of England are liable to be through
European complications that may any day arise.
"Blood is thicker than water," said the American
naval captain at the mouth of the Pei-ho, thirty years
ago, when an English squadron was in difficulties
with the Chinese forts ; and he carried his ships
to their assistance. The course of the captain was

1 Our Kin across the Sea, p. 181, etc.

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 357

sustained at home. Blood should he held to be
thicker than water in such a crisis as has been de-
scribed. Our course toward Asia has been full of sel-
fish blundering. The Anglo-Saxon deserves to suf-
fer ; he does not, however, deserve to be permanently
crippled. Could the greatest of English-speaking
lands look on unmoved while a Mongolian dominion
was established in the South Pacific over Anglo-
Saxon ruins? Such a danger is not probable, but
only possible. Let us pass, however, to the consid-
eration of a peril similar in kind, which is more liable
to be sometime imminent.

Gladstone remarked not long since that the vital
forces of Europe are becoming exhausted ; that
the bone and sinew have gone to America, Asia,
Africa, or Australia ; that only two nations know
how to colonize — England and Russia ; that they
therefore alone have any future; that other nations
are on the decline; and the time is not
far off when they will disappear from
among first-class powers.^ It is an ungracious thing
to say, but much can be affirmed to sustain the posi-
tion, that of European nations, only England and
Russia have a great future. All others are confined
within narrow limits. "In the matter of colonies
more than anything else, the proverb ' Tarde veni-
entibus ossa ' holds goods. England long ago swal-
lowed all the fat pickings and left only meagre glean-
ings." 2 For other European people, Russia excepted,

1 Novoe Vremya, ol St. Petersburg, quoted by W. D. Foulke, " Slav
or Saxon," p. 1.

2 Vambery in " The Fornm," November, 1888, art. " Is the Power of
England Declining?" p. 232. See also Sir Charles Dilke's "Problems
of Greater Britain," pp. 1 and 697.

358 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

there is now no room for expansion were the ability
to colonize ever so marked. No one fails to see the
greatness of Russia and the certainty that it is to
increase. In fact, there is no parallel in the history
of the world to the growth of this centralized despot-
ism ; already it possesses nearly one-sixth part of
the land on the globe, a territory lying contiguous,
and however unfitted in parts for human occupancy
through cold and sterility, to a large extent possess-
ing all the conditions for calling out the utmost vigor
of men. Her natural resources are boundless ; both
in Europe and Asia, Russia is for the most part a vast
plain, much of which is very fertile, well watered,
in every way fitted for agriculture ; as to mineral
wealth, no other land of the earth, probably, holds
such stores of coal, iron, oil, silver, and gold.

The Slavic race, ignorant and strangely docile, full
of patience and fortitude, is characterized also by a
Sketch of ™ig^ty energy, sluggish, indeed, but endur-
Kuasia. jjjg ^q ^]jg g^j^ gj^^ submitting itself readUy

to outside guidance. Singularly enough, in Russia
may be found a vigorous form of local self-govern-
ment. The town-meeting in its best days was scarcely
more alive in New England than in the mir, or Rus-
sian village. The tun-moot has always been held to
be the best possible school for freedom, but in Russia
freedom stops with the mir. Almost exclusively the
people cultivate the soil : there is too little diversity
of occupation to call out intelligence. The vast
stretches of the empire prevent the contact of part
with part, in friction which might strike out sparks
of civilization. Whereas, among the Angles and
Saxons, above the primary moot, came the moots of

ENGLISH-SPEAKmG FRATERNITY. 359

hundred, shire, and of the nation, the primitive Slavs
stopped with the first step : the small neighborhoods,
instead of uniting, were hostile to one another ; so
torn by dissensions in fact that the aid of foreigners
was invoked to avert intolerable disorder. Hence
the introduction, in the ninth century, of the line of
Rurik, from Scandinavia, — still another of those bril-
liant, ubiquitous Norsemen, who gave the early medi-
aeval world so many leaders. A period of Tartar
domination followed, — of merciless severity, — pass-
ing away at last, but leaving a people accustomed to an
absolute, centralized tyranny under which they were
depressed into utter serfdom. A sort of feudal sys-
tem introduced by the line of Rurik survived the
Tartar rule, and out of this came the nobility. As
our own times are approached, Russia offers the spec-
tacle of a people of serfs, bound to the soil and there
regulating their life in the mirs, but with T^jeateniDg
an absolute lord over them in the Czar, to ^"metAe-
whom they look as a sacred, almost a su- ^'op"*"'-
pernatural personage. A class of nobles, separated
from the people by an impassable gulf, exists, but of
a free middle class there is no trace. Though serf-
dom has been abolished, the people are scarcely raised.
The autocracy of the Czar, on the other hand, has
been strengthened through the diminution of the
power of the nobles, whose lands have been bestowed
upon the peasants. The people are treated as if they
were minors. " Neither a chair in a college nor a bed
in a hospital can be endowed without the interven-
tion of the State." The Russian, all his life, is " like
a soldier in his regiment, who marches, halts, ad-
vances, retreats, lifts his leg or his foot at the com-

360 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

mand of the instructing sergeant." Under Nicholas,
not a house of more than five windows could be
built without government leave. Nine-tenths of
the Russians are a peasantry, wholly ignorant, with
habits of submission as a part of their very fibre.
The moral and physical power of the Czar over
them in the intense centralization is never relaxed.
They are held as in a vice. As civilization grows in
Russia, by a strange inversion it seems at present
only to erect new bulwarks about despotism. The
advance of knowledge "appears only to strengthen
the hand of the master." The development of agri-
culture only fastens the peasant more firmly to the
soil ; the opening of mines only adds horror to penal
servitude ; the introduction of steam and electricity,
the central power controlling all means of intercom-
munication, only enables the autocrat to bring to
bear his authority more easily upon any point he
wishes to reach.

There is something awe-inspiring in the enormous-
ness of the might which the autocrat of all the Rus-
sias is so rapidly rolling up. His subjects at present
number one hundred and sixty million of souls living
under conditions, indeed, beset with difficulties, but
only such as serve to call into their best exercise
the human energies, upon a territory so vast that
even these multitudes seem a very sparse population.
The Slav has extraordinary assimilating power.
Eighty different races once occupied the empire, but
there is not one which the Slav has not swallowed,
or is not on the point of swallowing, making it in
language, in body, and in soul, part of himself. Even
the Anglo-Saxon appears to have no such power of

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 361

assimilation. The Russians, proceeding from the
little plateau of Valdai, in the northwest of Euro-
pean Russia, southward over such immense tracts,
remain Russians still, only strengthened by what
they have absorbed. There is no limit to Russia's
aggressiveness. It rolls out of the north like a
snow-ball, cold before civilization, in each decade a
more crushing weight, always gathering a greater
and greater volume. In the village communities
land is assigned to families in proportion to their
size, — a provision most favorable to multiplication.

What if, in another hundred years, Russia should
become the dominant power of the world! It is
worth while to scan closely the features of the em-
pire which may be able, and is very likely to have
the will, to reduce the human race to vassalage. Is
there any hope that anything less dreary can come
about in its social condition, a condition which it may
have the power a century from now to attempt to
make universal? No hope, except from that little
class whom we have learned to regard with terror, —
the Nihilists. They belong to the small number of
educated men and women, for the most part nobles.
Their effort is desperate, undertaken in the face of
risks which have been presented to the world by
most graphic pens and pencils. Often they are
truly self-sacrificing, acting in behalf of the peasants
for whom they desire to shape a higher life.^ It has

1 The following demands are said to have been laid before the pres-
ent Czar at his accession by the executive committee of the Nihilists : —

1. A general amnesty for political offenders, and a convention of
representatives of the people to examine the best forms of social and
political life ; to this convention deputies to be chosen by all classes
without distinction.

362 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

been well said that in their methods they are to be
compared with John Brown. Like him, the impulse
is the best ; but maddened at the magnitude of
the obstacles, they pursue almost the methods of
insanity.

Such is Russia in her constitution, such in her
history, such in her prospects. Shall we calmly say
that the Anglo-Saxon race has no duty before it
in view of such facts ? It would be humiliation
unspeakable to see the Czar installed in the position
of dictator of the world, with submissive English-
speaking races crouching at his footstool. Pride,
however, is a low motive to which to appeal. We
believe that the welfare of the human race is bound
up with the development of Anglo-Saxon freedom.
At present the Anglo-Saxon world is sharply sun-
dered, the inharmonious parts holding one another
aloof; and though substantially one in language,
literature, institutions, and every detail of life, nurs-
ing old prejudices that promote a harmful fret.
Though, to be sure, England confronts the one hun-
dred and sixty million of Russia with three hundred
million in her own empire, yet two hundred and fifty
million of these are the Asiatics, over whom her do-
minion is confessed to be so precarious that it may be
dissolved in an hour. Said Lord Randolph Churchill,
of British dominion in India, " It is a thin coat of oil
on the surface which preserves the calm of an ocean

2. No restriction of any kind on electors or deputies.

3. The government to grant, as provisional regulations, complete
freedom of speech, of thepress, and of public meeting.

The Nihilists solemnly promise to submit unconditionally to the
decision of such an assembly as regards a proper constitution for Russia.

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 363

of humanity and controls its storms." Undoubtedly,
British rule has been beneficent ; order has come out
of chaos ; justice out of rapine ; humanity after the
spirit of murder. No bond of any strength, however,
it is confessed, binds the confusion of Mahometans
and idol-worshippers of a hundred kinds, to the white-
faced strangers who have come among them. A few
hundred civil officials, a few thousand soldiers scat-
tered about the immense peninsula, wield the power
of England, their only safety being that the mastered
cannot combine against them. But any day the
closing hour of the English rule in India may strike.
In 1857, that power hung by a hair, and its con-
dition may any day be again as precarious.

The Anglo-Saxons of the British empire are some
sixty millions, as the Americans are some sixty mil-
lions. It is only upon that stock and upon those whom
that stock has assimilated that dependence can be
placed. Russia alone nearly or quite at the present
hour balances the two together. Whose chances are
to-day the more promising for rapid growth in the
near future into compact, effective might, — those of
the Slav or the Anglo-Saxon ? Have we not here a
consideration worth weighing in favor of Anglo-Saxon
fraternity, in the expediency of making a good front
against the Slav ?

It is not merely or mainly fighting the Slav of
which the Anglo-Saxon should think. Of course, we
will fight rather than go down, if barbarian Russia,
having become still more the colossus of nations, is
as ready with her bayonets in the future as she has
been in the past. It is better, however, to think of
the indirect but mighty influence which would go

364 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

forth into Russia, from a league of free states so
poAverful that she would be forced to respect them.
Russia has the germs within her of freedom. Her
yast hordes of peasants are capable of being guided
into a free life. Among her nobles are heroes ready-
in the most desperate times, even to face torture and
death to break the chains. In the line of Czars, even,
come characters like Catharine and Alexander, of a
humane and liberal spirit. Now, all free dispositions
seem to be forced back. A noble youth comes upon
the throne and begins reforms ; but overcome by his
environment, he soon grows reactionary: patriots,
discouraged, fall into the madness of nihilism. Mean-
time, the vast despotism, in spite of the disintegrating
forces within itself, keeps heaping up power upon
power. If it becomes dominant, with nothing in the
world that it needs to fear, how faint the likelihood
that it can improve from within ! Confronted, how-
ever, by freedom, as well armed as itself, as compact,
as numerous, what hope that the forces within that
make for good will at last prevail ! An Anglo-Saxon
fraternity must not come about in obedience to a low
race pride. If that were the motive, the Slav would
be more worthy to rule than we ; for each one of
those million soldiers is ready to give up life in a
pathetic and thoroughly honest enthusiasm for holy
Russia as the worthy mistress of nations. Is it beyond
hope that if Anglo-Saxons must sometime confront
Russia, they may feel an enthusiasm equally honest
and unselfish, while standing for ideas which are to
bless mankind?

Tennyson sung in his youth of —

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 365

"The parliament of man, the federation of the world,"

SO far, no doubt, a Utopian dream, but who will say
it may not some time be approached ? Said Lessing
once, in words which have often been regarded as
startling, " According to my way of think- L,,,i„g„„d
ing the reputation of a zealous patriot is ^?fue of pa^*
the very last that I would covet ; that is, '"°""°-
of patriotism which teaches me to forget that I am a
citizen of the world." ^ Lessing's heart demanded
something far broader than what often passes under
the name of patriotism. He loved to call himself a cos-
mopolite, and any national feeling which interfered
with the most liberal humanity, love for the entire race,
he felt to be vicious. He asserted that in history the
individual had often been sacrificed to the State, and
entertained the idea that a body of superior men might
be constituted in every nation who should live above

, all narrowness, and striving to draw mankind into a
brotherhood, should work together for the abrogation
of national lines. — In a similar spirit Goethe ex-
claimed: "Altogether, national hatred is a curious
thing. You will always find it strongest and most

, violent in the lowest stage of culture. But there is
a stage where it vanishes completely, and where one
feels himself to a certain extent above nations, and
feels the weal and woe of a neighboring people as one's
own. This degree of culture was conformable to my
nature, and I had been strengthened in it long before
my sixtieth year."

Who will maintain that a great part of what has
passed in the world for patriotism, and been praised

I Gespracbe fiir Frelmauier,

366 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

to the skies as one of the chief of yirtues, is, after all.
Love of anything else than an expansion of selfish-
higher'than ness ? The selfish man, pure and simple,
try. is he who has no thought beyond what is

wrapped in his own skin, and is utterly careless as
to whether all beside flourish or suffer. Such un-
mixed selfishness, however, we may be sure, rarely,
perhaps never, appears. Each human being has a
certain environment, — his family, his religious sect,
his political party, the State of which he is a citizen,
— which he identifies with himself, and for whose
welfare he schemes and labors. No doubt selfishness
broadens toward a noble principle in proportion as
the individual includes within the circle of his regard
a wider and wider circle. Yet in the highest view,
any limitation of the sympathies is to be regretted
which prevents a thorough, generous going out of
the heart toward the whole human race. In the
great teacher, Christ, the eminent beauty is that from *
him love goes forth unrestrained ; it knows no limits
of family, city, country, or race. It is easy to con-
ceive of a love of family, or of class, or of country,
which may have a most unamiable side. When the
riches of a man's heart are quite exhausted within
these narrow circles, leaving only coldness or hatred
for the world beyond, we see simply an expansion of
selfishness, — more amiable, no doubt, than regard
that is entirely self-centred, but a sentiment short
of the highest. "A single life," says Lord Bacon,
" doeth well with churchmen, for charity will hardly
water the ground where it must first fill a pool." ^
The philosopher has in mind the weakness of human
1 Essays; " Of Marriage and Single Life."

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 367

nature, and asserts that a man surrounded by a
family will of necessity exhaust his love within the
confined circle, having none left for the world at
large ; hence, let the priest, who should in an espe-
cial way be the servant of humanity, be a celibate.
The ideal soul, however, it may be replied, will possess
a store of charity so abundant that the needs of the
ground will be met as well as of the pool. It is some-
thing toward which the world must grow. The doc-
trine of Lessing and Goethe, now no doubt imprac-
ticable, we can yet see is elevated teaching, to follow
which will not always be beyond the power of man.
Look carefully at what has been admired as patriot-
ism. If we go to Greece, how many are there among
her heroes who, when they give themselves to sword
or spear, have a thought beyond Greece ? Bdpl3apoi,
are all others, not precious and worthy to die for. If
we go to Rome, it is simply for Rome that the heroes
die, — for country ; but there is no thought beyond
the country. To die for that was the last refine-
ment of the Roman virtus, the sublimest limit of
honor. If the country were wrong, if it stood as a
curse in the world rather than a blessing, it was the
same. So the wild Highlander or semi-barbarian
mediaeval prince for his first virtue held loyalty to
his clan or gens, — Campbell or Gordon, Orsini or
Colonna, York or Lancaster ; or to his suzerain lord,
— confronting all else with the spear-point and the
axe's edge. Louis XIV lived, as he thought, for
France, and to aggrandize her laid waste the world
elsewhere with fire and sword; and how often in
every civilized land has a narrow national feeling in
the hearts of soldiers and statesmen, baptized by a

368 ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM.

name held in honor, and lauded as a virtue beyond
all price, brought misery upon millions !

There are signs, however, of something better.
Our age is noteworthy through its tendency to unifi-
Biessings of catiou. Through Cavour, disintegrated Italy
unification, j^g^g comc together into a great and power-
ful kingdom under the leadership of the able house
of Savoy. Still more memorably, Germany has been
redeemed from the granulation which for so many
ages past has made her a mere rope of sand, her
petty principalities and kingdoms becoming plaited
at length into a nation magnificent in size, power,
and ability. Such coalescing can be regarded as only
advantageous, if we look toward the general welfare
of the human race. The blending of small nation-
alities into great States, and of States into still larger
unions, which marks the world to-day, is a subject
for rejoicing ; because by such a gradual coalescing of
related parts we are advancing toward a time when
narrowing lines shall be done away, and men sit down
together as one family.

Humanity at large will be benefited, but still more
than this. By such political unification, the indi-
vidual man is enlarged and lifted up. There is some-
thing in the remark of Froude : " The dimension and
value of any single man depend upon the body of
which he is a member. ... A citizen of an imperial
power expands to the scope and fulness of the larger
organism, — the grander the organism, the larger and
more important the unit that knows he belongs to
it. His thoughts are wider, his interests less selfish,
his ambitions ampler and nobler. . . . Behind each
American citizen America is standing, and he knows

ENGLISH-SPEAKING FRATERNITY. 369

it, — is the man that he is because he knows it. . . .
A great nation makes great men ; a small nation
makes little men." ^

If the considerations presented haye value, they
weigh in favor of the position that English-speaking
peoples should come into accord. States j.^^ ^j^^ ^^^^^
between which there exists some likeness ftoDard/stinc-
must first draw toward one another, if the mu^'firaueek
world is to move in the direction of the ''''°'
fraternity of which the benevolent have dreamed.
A brotherhood of humanity ! How desirable a culmi-
nation for the work of the high souls, who, during
the two thousand years we have reviewed, have, each
in his own generation, striven to sustain Anglo-
Saxon freedom !

" The death of nations in their work hegan ;
They sowed the seed of federated man.
Dead nations were biit selfish hordes, and we
The first battalion of humanity !
All living nations while our tokens shine,
One after one shall wheel into our fine ;
Our free-bom heritage shall be the guide
And bloodless order of their regicide.
The sea shall join, not limit ; mountains stand
Dividing farm from farm, not land from land." ^

1 Oceana, pp. 355, 356.

2 John Boyle O'Beilly, Poem at Plymouth, August 1, 1889.

NOTE.

Magna Chakta, the Petition of Eight, and the Bill
of Rights were called by the Earl of Chatham the Bible
of the English Constitution. Regarding, as is done in this
book, the constitutional history of the entire English-
speaking race, we can place two other memorable docu-
ments in the canon with the three mentioned. They are
the Constitution of the United States, under which ordered
liberty is secured for the larger division of the English-
speaking race ; and the British North American Act of
1867, which forms at present the Constitution of federated
British America, and will, before long, probably furnish
the model for the polity of Greater Britain in general.
In the following Appendices, Magna Charta, the Petition
of Eight, and the Bill of Eights, are presented in full,
the text in the case of Magna Charta being rendered
from the Latin. The two remaining documents are too
long to be reproduced here in full, and are therefore
summarized. The risumi of the Constitution of the
United States is based upon that of Professor Alex-
ander Johnson, in the "Encyclopaedia Britannica"; that
of the Constitution of Canada, upon the abridgment,
by the Hon. H. B. Witton of Ontario, contained in
Lalor's " Cyclopaedia of Political Science and Political
Economy." Eor the full text of the British North
American Act of 1867, with an intelligent commen-
tary, the reader is referred to the work of Hon. J. Gr.
Bourinot, " The Constitution of Canada."

APPENDIX A.

MAGNA CHARTAi

Or the Gkeat Charter op King John, Granted June 15,
A.D. 1215.

(TranBlation from the Latin.)

John, by the Grace of God, King of England, Lord of Ireland,
Duke of Normandy, Aquitaine, and Count of Anjou, to his Arch-
bishops, Bishops, Abbots, Earls, Barons, Justiciaries, Foresters,
Sheriffs, Governors, Officers, and to all Bailiffs, and his faithful
subjects, greeting. Know ye, that we, in the presence of God,
and for the salvation of our soul, and the souls of all our ancestors
and heirs, and unto the honour of God and the advancement of
Holy Church, and amendment of our Realm, by advice of our
venerable Fathers, Stephen, Archbishop of Canterbury, Primate of
all England and Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church ; Henry,
Archbishop of Dublin ; William, of London ; Peter, of Winchester ;
Jocelin, of Bath and Glastonbury ; Hugh, of Lincoln ; Walter, of
Worcester; William, of Coventry; Benedict, of Rochester — Bish-
ops : of Master Pandulph, Sub-Deacon and Familiar of our Lord
the Pope ; Brother Aymeric, Master of the Knights- Templars in
England ; and of the noble Persons, William Maresoall, Earl of
Pembroke ; William, Earl of Salisbury ; William, Earl of Warren ;
William, Earl of Arundel ; Alan de Galloway, Constable of Scot-
land ; Warin FitzGerald, Peter EitzHerbert, and Hubert de Burgh,
Seneschal of Poitou; Hugh de Neville, Matthew FitzHerbert,
Thomas Basset, Alan Basset, Philip of Albiney, Robert de Roppell,
John Mareschal, John FitzHugh, and others, our liegemen, have,
in the first place, granted to God, and by this our present Charter
confirmed, for us and our heirs for ever : —

1. That the Church of England shall be free, and have her
whole rights, and her liberties inviolable ; and we will have them

1 Old South Leaflets, 0eneral Series, No. 3.

372 APPENDIX A.

so observed, that it may appear thence that the freedom of elec-
tions, which is reckoned chief and indispensable to the English
Church, and which we granted and confirmed by our Charter, and
obtained the confirmation of the same from our Lord the Pope
Innocent III., before the discord between us and our barons, was
granted of mere free will ; which Charter we shaU observe, and we
do wiU it to be faithfully observed by our heirs for ever.

2. "We also have granted to all the freemen of our kingdom, for
us and for our heirs for ever, all the underwritten liberties, to be
had and holden by them and their heirs, of us and our heirs for
ever: If any of our earls, or barons, or others, who hold of us in
chief by military service, shall die, and at the time of his death his
heir shall be of full age, and owe a relief, he shall have his inheri-
tance by the ancient relief — that is to_say, the heir or heirs of an
earl, for a whole earldom, by a hundred pounds ; the heir or heirs
of a baron, for a whole barony, by a hundred pounds; the heir or
heirs of a knight, for a whole knight's fee, by a hundred shillings at
most; and whoever oweth less shall give less, according to the
ancient custom of fees.

3. But if the heir of any such shall be under age, and shall be
in ward, when he comes of age he shall have his inheritance vyith-
out relief and without fine.

4. The keeper of the land of such an heir being under age, shall
take of the land of the heir none but reasonable issues, reasonable
customs, and reasonable services, and that without destruction and
waste of his men and his goods ; and if we commit the custody of
any such lands to the sheriff, or any other who is answerable to us
for the issues of the land, and he shall make destruction and waste
of the lands which he hath in custody, we will take of him amends,
and the land shall be committed to two lawful and discreet men of
that fee, who shall answer for the issues to us, or to him to whom
we shall assign them ; and if we sell or give to any one the custody
of any such lands, and he therein make destruction or waste, he
shall lose the same custody, which shall be committed to two law-
ful and discreet men of that fee, who shall in like manner answer
to us as aforesaid.

5. But the keeper, so long as he shall have the custody of the
land, shall keep up the houses, parks, warrens, ponds, mills, and
other things pertaining to the land, out of the issues of the same
land ; and shall deliver to the heir, when he comes of full age, his
whole land, stocked with ploughs and carriages, according as the

APPENDIX A. 373

time of wamage shall require, and the issues of the land can reason-
ably bear.

6. Heirs shall be married without disparagement, and so that
before matrimony shall be contracted, those who are near in blood
to the heir shall have notice.

7. A widow, after the death of her husband, shall forthwith
and without difficulty have her marriage and inheritance ; nor shall
she give anything for her dower, or her marriage, or her inheri-
tance, which her husband and she held at the day of his death ;
and she may remain in the mansion house of her husband forty
days after his death, within which time her dower shall be assigned.

8. No widow shall be distrained to marry herself, so long as
she has a mind to live without a husband ; but yet she shall give
security that she will not marry without our assent, if she hold of
us ; or without the consent of the lord of whom she holds, if she
hold of another.

9. Neither we nor our bailiffs shall seize any land or rent for
any debt so long as the chattels of the debtor are sufficient to pay
the debt ; nor shall the sureties of the debtor be distrained so long
as the principal debtor has sufficient to pay the debt ; and if the
principal debtor shall fail in the payment of the debt, not having
wherewithal to pay it, then the sureties shall answer the debt ; and
if they will they shall have the lands and rents of the debtor, until
they shall be satisfied for the debt which they paid for him, unless
the principal debtor can show himself acquitted thereof against
the said sureties.

10. If any one have borrowed anything of the Jews, more or
less, and die before the debt be satisfied, there shall be no interest
paid for that debt, so long as the heir is under age, of whomsoever
he may hold ; and if the debt falls into our hands, we will only
take the chattel mentioned in the deed.

11. And if any one shall die indebted to the Jews, his wife shall
have her dower and pay nothing of that debt ; and if the deceased
left children under age, they shall have necessaries provided for
them, according to the tenement of the deceased ; and out of the
residue the debt shall be paid, saving, however, the service due to
the lords, and in like manner shall it be done touching debts due to
others than the Jews.

12. No Bcutage or aid shall be imposed in our kingdom, unless
by the general council of our kingdom ; except for ransoming our
person, making our eldest son a knight, and once for marrying our

374 APPENDIX A.

eldest daughter ; and for these there shall he paid no more than a
reasonable aid. In like manner it shall be concerning the aids of
the City of London.

13. And the City of London shall have all its ancient liberties
and free customs, as well by land as by water : furthermore, we
will and grant that all other- cities and boroughs, and towns and
ports, shall have all their liberties and free customs.

14. And for holding the general council of the kingdom concern-
ing the assessment of aids, except in the three cases aforesaid, and
for the assessing of scutages, we shall cause to be summoned the
archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls, and greater barons of the
realm, singly by our letters. And furthermore, we shall cause to
be summoned generally, by our sheriffs and bailiffs, all others who
hold of us in chief, for a certain day, that is to say, forty days
before their meeting at least, and to a certain place ; and in all
letters of such summons we will declare the cause of such summons.
And summons being thus made, the business shall proceed on the
day appointed, according to the advice of such as shall be present,
although all that were summoned come not.

15. We will not for the future grant to any one that he may
take aid of his own free tenants, unless to ransom his body, and to
make his eldest son a knight, and once to marry his eldest daughter ;
and for this there shall be only paid a reasonable aid.

16. No man shall be distrained to perform more service for a
knight's fee, or other free tenement, than is due from thence.

17. Common pleas shall not follow our court, but shall be holden
in some place certain.

18. Trials upon the "Writs of Novel Disseisin,i and of Mort
d' ancestor," and of Darrein Presentment,' shall not be taken but in
their proper counties, and after this manner : We, or if we should
be out of the realm, our chief justiciary, will send two justiciaries
through every county four times a year, who, with four knights of
each county, chosen by the county, shall hold the said assizes * In
the county, on the day, and at the place appointed.

19. And if any matters cannot be determined on the day

1 Dispossession.

^ Death of the ancestor ; that is, in cases of disputed succession to land.

8 Last presentation to a henelice.

* The word Assize here means " an assembly of knights or other substantial
persons, held at a certain time and place where they sit with the Justice.
• Assisa ' or ' Assize ' is also taken for the court, place, or time at which the writs
of Assize are taken." — Thompson's Notes,

APPENDIX A. 375

appointed for holding tlie assizes in each county, so many of the
knights and freeholders as have heen at the assizes aforesaid shall
stay to decide them as is necessary, according as there is more or
less business.

20. A freeman shall not be amerced for a small offence, but only
according to the degree of the offence ; and for a great crime
according to the heinousness of it, saving to him his contenement ; i
and after the same manner a merchant, saving to Mm his merchan-
dise. And a villein shall be amerced after the same manner, saving
to him his wainage, if he falls under our mercy ; and none of the
aforesaid amerciaments shall be assessed but by the oath of honest
men in the neighbourhood.

21. Earls and barons shall not be amerced but by their peers,
and after the degree of the offence.

22. No ecclesiastical person shall be amerced for his lay tene-
ment, but according to the proportion of the others aforesaid, and
not according to the value of his ecclesiastical benefice.

23. Neither a tovni nor any tenant shall be distrained to make
bridges or embankments, unless that anciently and of right they
are bound to do it.

24. No sheriff, constable, coroner, or other our bailiffs, shall
hold " Pleas of the Crovm." ^

25. All counties, hundreds, wapentakes, and trethings, shall
stand at the old rents, without any increase, except in our demesne
manors.

26. If any one holding of us a lay fee die, and the sheriff, or
our bailiffs, show our letters patent of summons for debt which the
dead man did owe to us, it shall be lawful for the sheriff or our
baUiff to attach and register the chattels of the dead, found upon
his lay fee, to the amount of the debt, by the view of lawful men,
so as nothing be removed until our whole clear debt be paid ; and
the rest shall be left to the executors to fulfil the testament of the
dead ; and if there be nothing due from him to us, all the chattels
shall go to the use of the dead, saving to his wife and children their
reasonable shares.'

1 " That by which a person subsists and which is essential to his rank in
life."

2 These are suits conducted in the name of the Crown against criminal
offenders.

' A person's goods were divided into three parts, of which one went to his
wife, another to his heirs, and a third he was at liberty to dispose of. If he had
no child, his widow had half; and if he had children, but no wife, half was

376 APPENDIX A.

27. If any freeman shall die Intestate, his chattels shall he dis-
tributed by the hands of his nearest relations and friends, by view
of the Church, saving to every one his debts vrhich the deceased
owed to him.

28. No constable or bailiff of ours shall take corn or other chat-
tels of any man unless he presently give him money for it, or hath
respite of payment by the good-wiU of the seller.

29. No constable shall distrain any knight to give money for
castle-guard, if he himself will do it in his person, or by another
able man, in case he cannot do it through any. reasonable cause.
And if we have carried or sent him into the army, he shall be free
from such guard for the time he shall be in the army by our
command.

30. No sheriff or bailiff of ours, or any other, shall take horses
or carts of any freeman for carriage, without the assent of the said
freeman.

31. Neither shall we nor our bailiffs take any man's timber for
our castles or other uses, unless by the consent of the ovfner of the
timber.

32. "We will retain the lands of those convicted of felony only
one year and a day, and then they shall be delivered to the lord of
the f ee.i

33. All kydells '^ (wears) for the time to come shall be put down
in the rivers of Thames and Medway, and throughout aU England,
except upon the sea-coast.

34. The writ wliich is called prxcvpe, for the future, shall not
be made out to any one, of any tenement, whereby a freeman may
lose his court.

35. There shall be one measure of wine and one of ale through
our whole realm ; and one measure of corn, that is to say, the
London quarter ; and one breadth of dyed cloth, and russets, and

divided amongst them. These several sums were called " reasonable shares."
Through the testamentary jurisdiction they gradually acquired the clergy often
contrived to get into their own hands all the residue of the estate without paying
the debts of the estate.

1 All forfeiture for felony has been abolished by the 33 and 34 Vic. c. 23. It
seems to have originated in the destruction of the felon's property being part of
the sentence, and this " waste " being commuted for temporary possession by
the Crown.

^ The purport of this was to prevent enclosures of common property, or com-
mitting a. " Purpresture." These wears are now called "kettles" or "kettle-
nets " in Kent and Cornwall.

APPENDIX A. 377

haberjeets, that is to say, two ells within the lists ; and it shall be
of weights as it is of measures.

36. Nothing from henceforth shall be given or taken' for a writ
of inquisition of life or limb, but it shall be granted freely, and not
denied.i

37. If any do hold of us by fee-farm, or by socage, or by
burgage, and he hold also lands of any other by linight's service,
we will not have the custody of the heir or land, which is holden of
another man's fee by reason of that fee- farm, socage,^ or burgage;
neither will we have the custody of the fee-farm, or socage, or
burgage, unless knight's service was due to us out of the same fee-
farm. We will not have the custody of an heir, nor of any land
which he holds of another by knight's service, by reason of any
petty serjeanty s.by which he holds of us, by the service of paying
a knife, an arrow, or the like.

38. No bailiff from henceforth shall put any man to his law *
upon his own bare saying, without credible witnesses to prove it.

39. No freeman shall be taken or imprisoned, or disseised, or
outlawed, or banished, or any ways destroyed, nor will we pass
upon him, nor will we send upon him, unless by the lawful judg-
ment of his peers, or by the law of the land.

40. We will sell to no man, we will not deny to any man, either
justice or right.

41. All merchants shall have safe and secure conduct, to go out
of, and to come into England, and to stay there and to pass as well
by land as by water, for buying and selling by the ancient and
allowed customs, without any unjust tolls ; except in time of war,
or when they are of any nation at war with us. And if there be
found any such in our land, in the beginning of the war, they shall
be attached, without damage to their bodies or goods, until it be
known unto us, or our chief justiciary, how our merchants be
treated iu the nation at war with us ; and if ours be safe there, the
others shall be safe in our dominions.

^Thia important writ, or "writ concerning hatred and malice," may have
been the prototype of the writ of Habeas Corpus, and was granted for a similar
purpose.

2 "Socage" signifies lands held by tenure of performing certain inferior
offices in husbandry, probably from the old French word soc, a plough-share.

8 The tenure of giving the king some small weapon of war in acknowledg-
ment of lands held.

* Equivalent to putting him to his oath. This alludes to the Wager of Law,
by which a defendant and his eleven supporters or " compurgators " could ewesr
to his non-liability, and this amounted to a verdict In bis favor.

378 APPENDIX A.

42. It shall be lawful, for the time to come, for any one to go
out of our kingdom, and return safely and securely by land or by
water, saving his allegiance to us ; unless in time of war, by some
short space, for the common benefit of the realm, except pris-
oners and outlaws, according to the law of the land, and people
in war with us, and merchants who shall be treated as is above
mentioned.1

43. If any man hold of any escheat,^ as of the honour of Wal-
lingford, Nottingham, Boulogne, Lancaster, or of other escheats
which be in our hands, and are baronies, and die, his heir shall give
no other relief, and perform no other service to us than he would
to thfe baron, if it were in the baron's hand ; and we will hold it
after the same manner as the baron held it.

44. Those men who dwell without the forest from henceforth
shall not come before our justiciaries of the forest, upon common
summons, but such as are impleaded, or are sureties for any that
are attached for something concerning the forest.'

45. We will not make any justices, constables, sheriffs, or
bailiffs, but of such as know the law of the realm and mean duly to
observe it.

46. All barons who have founded abbeys, which they hold by
charter from the kings of England, or by ancient tenure, shall have
the keeping of them, when vacant, as they ought to have.

47. All forests that have been made forests in our time shall
forthwith be disforested; and the same shall be done with the
water-banks that have been fenced in by us in our time.

48. All evil customs concerning forests, warrens, foresters, and
warreners, sheriffs and their officers, water- banks and their keepers,
shall forthwith be inquired into in each county, by twelve sworn
knights of the saipe county, chosen by creditable persons of the
same county ; and within forty days after the said inquest be
utterly abolished, so as never to be restored : so as we are first

1 The Crown has still technically the power of confining subjects within the
kingdom by the writ " ne exeat regno," though the use of the writ is rarely
resorted to.

2 The word escheat is derived from the French escheoir, to return or happen,
and signifies the return of an estate to a lord, either on failure of tenant's issue
or on his committing felony. The abolition of Feudal tenures by the Act of
Charles 11. (12 Charles U. o. 24) rendered obsolete this part and many other parts
of the Charter.

'The laws for regulating the Eoyal forests, and administering justice in
respect of offences committed in their precincts, formed a large part of the law.

APPENDIX A. 379

acquainted therewith, or our justiciary, if we should not be in
England.

49. We will immediately give up all hostages and charters
delivered unto us by our English subjects, as securities for their
keeping the peace, and yielding us faithful service.

50. We will entirely remove from their bailiwicks the relations
of Gerard de Atheyes, so that for the future they shall have no
bailiwick in England; we will also remove Engelard de Cygony,
Andrew, Peter, and Gyon, from the Chancery ; Gyon de Cygony,
Geoffrey de Martyn, and his brothers ; Philip Mark, and his
brothers, and his nephew, Geoffrey, and their whole retinue.

51. As soon as peace is restored, we will send out of the king-
dom all foreign knights, cross-bowmen, and stipendiaries, who are
come vrith horses and arms to the molestation of our people.

52. If any one has been dispossessed or deprived by us, without
the lawful judgment of his peers, of his lands, castles, liberties, or
right, we vriU forthwith restore them to him ; and if any dispute
arise upon this head, let the matter be decided by the five-and-
twenty barons hereafter mentioned, for the preservation of the
peace. And for all those things of which any person has, without
the lawful judgment of his peers, been dispossessed or deprived,
either by our father King Henry, or our brother King Kichard, and
which we have in our hands, or are possessed by others, and we
are bound to warrant and make good, we shall have a respite till
the term usually allowed the crusaders ; excepting those things
about which there is a plea depending, or whereof an inquest hath
been made, by our order before we undertook the crusade ; but as
soon as we return from our expedition, or if perchance we tarry at
home and do not make our expedition, we will immediately cause
full justice to be administered therein.

53. The same respite we shall have, and in the same manner,
about administering justice, disafforesting or letting continue the
forests, which Henry our father, and our brother Richard, have
afforested; and the same concerning the wardship of the lands
which are in another's fee, but the wardship of which we have
hitherto had, by reason of a fee held of us by knight's service ; and
for the abbeys founded in any other fee than our own, in which the
lord of the fee says he has a right ; and when we return from our
expedition, or if we tarry at home, and do not make our expedition,
we will immediately dg full justice to all the complainants in this
behalf.

380 APPENDIX A.

54. No man shall be taken or imprisoned upon the appeal i of a
woman, for the death of any other than her husband.

55. All unjust and illegal fines made by us, and all amercia-
ments imposed unjustly and contrary to the law of the land, shall
be entirely given up, or else be left to the decision of the five-and-
twenty barons hereafter mentioned for the preservation of the
peace, or of the major part of them, together with the aforesaid
Stephen, Archbishop of Canterbury, if he can be present, and
others whom he shall think fit to invite ; and if he cannot be pres-
ent, the business shall notwithstanding go on without him ; but so
that if one or more of the aforesaid five-and- twenty barons be plain-
tiffs in the same cause, they shall be set aside as to what concerns
this particular affair, and others be chosen in their room, out of the
said flve-and-twenty, and sworn by the rest to decide the matter.

56. If we have disseised or dispossessed the Welsh of any lands,
liberties, or other things, vnthout the legal judgment of their peers,
either in England or in Wales, they shall be immediately restored
to them ; and if any dispute arise upon this head, the matter shall
be determined in the Marches by the judgment of their peers ; for
tenements in England according to the law of England, for tene-
ments in Wales according to the law of Wales, for tenements of
the Marches according to the law of the Marches : the same shall
the Welsh do to us and our subjects.

57. As for all those things of which a Welshman hath, without
the lawful judgment of his peers, been disseised or deprived of by
King Henry our father, or our brother King Richard, and which we
either have in our hands or others are possessed of, and we are
obliged to warrant it, we shall hawe a respite till the time generally
allowed the crusaders ; excepting those things about which a suit is
depending, or whereof an inquest has been made by our order,
before we undertook the crusade : but when we return, or if we
stay at home without performing our expedition, we will immedi-
ately do them full justice, according to the laws of the Welsh and
of the parts before mentioned.

58. We will without delay dismiss the son of Llewellin, and all
the Welsh hostages, and release them from the engagements they
have entered into with us for the preservation of the peace.

^ An Appeal here mcaDs an " accusation." The Appeal here mentioned was
a suit for a penalty in which the plaintiff was a relation who had suffered through
a murder or manslaughter. One of the incidents of this " Appeal of Death " was
the Trial by Battle. These Appeals and Trial by Battle -wex^ not abolishecl
betoie the passing of the Act 69 dec. lU. c, 46.

APPENDIX A. 381

59. We will treat with. Alexander, King of Scots, concerning the
restoring his sisters and hostages, and his right and liberties, in the
same form and manner as we shall do to the rest of our barons of
England ; unless by the charters which we have from his father,
"William, late King of Soots, it ought to be otherwise ; and this
shall be left to the determination of his peers in our court.

60. All the aforesaid customs and liberties, which we have
granted to be holden in our kingdom, as much as it belongs to us,
all people of our kingdom, as well clergy as laity, shall observe, as
far as they are concerned, towards their dependents. '

61. And whereas, for the honour of God and the amendment of
our kingdom, and for the better quieting the discord that has arisen
between us and our barons, we have granted all these things
aforesaid ; willing to render them firm and lasting, we do give and
grant our subjects the underwritten security, namely that the
barons may choose five- and- twenty barons of the kingdom, whom
they think convenient ; who shall take care, with all their might,
to hold and observe, and cause to be observed, the peace and
liberties we have granted them, and by this our present Charter
confirmed in this manner ; that is to say, that i£ we, our justiciary,
our bailiEEs, or any of our of&oers, shall in any circumstance have
failed in the performance of them towards any person, or shall
have broken through any of these articles of peace and security,
and the offence be notified to four barons chosen out of the five-
and-twenty before mentioned, the said four barons shall repair to
us, or our justiciary, if we are out of the realm, and, laying open
the grievance, shall petition to have it redressed without delay : and
if it be not redressed by us, or if we should chance to be out of the
realm, if it should not be redressed by our justiciary within forty
days, reckoning from the time it has been notified to us, or to
our justiciary (if we should be out of the realm), the four barons
aforesaid shall lay the cause before the rest of the five-and-twenty
barons ; and the said five-and-twenty barons, together with the
community of the whole kingdom, shall distrain and distress us in
all the ways in which they shall be able, by seizing our castles, lands,
possessions, and in any other manner they can, till the grievance
is redressed, according to their pleasure ; saving harmless our own
person, and the persons of our Queen and children ; and when it
is redressed, they shall behave to us as before. And any person
whatsoever in the kingdom may swear that he will obey the orders
of the five-and-twenty barons aforesaid. in the execution of the

382 APPENDIX A.

premises, and will distress us, jointly with them, to the utmost of
his power ; and we give public and free liberty to any one that shall
please to swear to this, and never will hinder any person from
taliing the same oath.

62. As for all those of our subjects who will not, of their own
accord, swear to join the five-and-twenty barons in distraining and
distressing us, we will issue orders to make them take the same
oath as aforesaid. And if any one of the five-and-twenty barons
dies, or goes out of the kingdom, or is hindered any other way
from carrying the things aforesaid into execution, the rest of the
said flve-and-twenty barons may choose another in his room, at
their discretion, who shall be sworn in like manner as the rest. In
all things that are committed to the execution of these five-and-
twenty barons, if, when they are all assembled together, they
should happen to disagree about any matter, and some of them,
when summoned, will not or cannot come, whatever is agreed
upon, or enjoined, by the major part of those that are present shall
be reputed as firm and valid as if all the five-and-twenty had given
their consent ; and the aforesaid five-and-twenty shall swear that
all the premises they shall faithfully observe, and cause with all
their power to be observed. And' we will procure nothing from
any one, by ourselves nor by another, whereby any of these con-
cessions and liberties may be revoked or lessened ; and if any such
thing shall have been obtained, let it be null and void ; neither
will we ever make use of it either by ourselves or any other. And
all the Ul-wUl, indignations, and rancours that have arisen between
us and our subjects, of the clergy and laity, from the first breaking
out of the dissensions between us, we do fully remit and forgive :
pioreover, all trespasses occasioned by the said dissensions, from
iEaster in the sixteenth year of our reign till the restoration of
peace and tranquillity, we hereby entirely remit to all, both clergy
and laity, and as far as in us lies do fuUy forgive. We have,
moreover, caused to be made for them the letters patent testimonial
of Stephen, Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, Henry, Lord Arch-
bishop of Dublin, and the bishops aforesaid, as also of Master
Pandulph, for the security and concessions aforesaid.

63. Wherefore we will and firmly enjoin, that the Church of
England be free, and that all men in our kingdom have and hold all
the aforesaid liberties, rights, and concessions, truly and peaceably,
freely and quietly, fully and wholly to themselves and their heirs,
of us and our heirs, in all things and places, for ever, as is afore-

APPENDIX B. 383

said. It is also sworn, as well on our part as on the part of tlie
barons, that all the things aforesaid shall be observed in good faith,
and without evil subtilty. Given under our hand, in the presence
of the witnesses above named, and many others, in the meadow
called Runingmede, between Windsor and Staines, the 15th day of
June, in the seventeenth year of our reign.

APPENDIX B.

THE PETITION OF EIGHT.

A.D. 1628. 3 Car. I. c. 1.

The Petition exhibited to his Majesty by the Lords Spiritual and
Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled,
concerning divers Bights and Liberties of the Subjects, with the
King's Majesty's royal answer thereunto in full Parliament.

To THE King's Most Excellent Majesty.

Humbly show unto our Sovereign Lord the King, the Lords Spir-
itual and Temporal, and Commons in Parliament assembled, that
whereas it is declared and enacted by a statute made ih the time of
the reign of King Edward I, commonly called Statutum de Tal-
lagio non concedendo, that no tallage or aids shall be laid or levied
by the king or his heirs in this realm, without the good-will and
assent of the archbishops, bishops, earls, barons, knights, bur-
gesses, and other the freemen of the commonalty of this realm;
and by authority of parliament holden in the five and twentieth
year of the reign of King Edward Third, it is declared and enacted
that from thenceforth no person should be compelled to make any
loans to the king against his will, because such loans were against
reason and the franchise of the land ; and by other laws of this
realm it is provided, that none should be charged by any charge or
imposition called a benevolence, nor by such like charge ; by which
statutes before mentioned, and other the good laws and statutes of
this realm, your subjects have inherited this freedom, that they
should not be compelled to contribute to any tax, tallage, aid, or
other like charge not set by common consent, in parliament.

384 APPENDIX B.

II. Yet nevertheless of late divers commissions directed to sun-
dry commissioners in several counties, -with instructions, have
issued ; by means vfhereof your people have heen in divers places
assembled, and required to lend certain sums of money unto your
Majesty, and many of them, upon their refusing so to do, have had
an oath administered unto them not warrantable by the laws or stat^
utes of this realm, and have been constrained to become bound and
make appearance and give utterance before your Privy Council and
in other places, and others of them have been therefore imprisoned,
confined, and sundry other ways molested and disquieted ; and
divers other charges have been laid and levied upon your people in
several counties by lord heutenants, deputy lieutenants, commis-
sioners for musters, justices of peace and others, by command or
direction from your Majesty, or your Privy Council, against the
laws and free customs of the realm.

III. And whereas also by the statute called " The Great Charter
of the liberties of England," it is declared and enacted, that no
freeman may be taken or imprisoned or be disseised of his freehold
or liberties, or his free customs, or be outlawed or exiled, or iu any
manner destroyed, but by the lawful judgment of his peers, or by.
the law of the land.

IV. And in the eight and twentieth year of the reign of King
Edward III, it was declared and enacted by authority of parlia-
ment, that no man, of what estate or condition that he be, should
be put out of his land or tenements, nor taken, nor imprisoned, nor
disherited, nor put to death without being brought to answer by
due process of law.

V. Nevertheless, against the tenor of the said statutes, and other,
the good laws and statutes of your realm to that end provided,
divers of your subjects have of late been imprisoned without any
cause showed ; and when for their deliverance they were brought
before your justices by your Majesty's writs of Habeas Corpus,
there to undergo and receive as the court should order, and their
keepers commanded to certify the causes of their detainer, no
cause was certified, but that they were detained by your Majesty's
special command, signified by the lords of your Privy Council,
and yet were returned back to several prisons, without being
charged with anything to which they might make answer according
to the law.

VI. And whereas of late great companies of soldiers and mari-
ners have been dispersed into divers counties of the realm, and the

APPENDIX B. 385

inhabitants against their wills have been compelled to receive them
into their houses, and there to suffer them to sojourn against the
laws and customs of tliis realm, and to the great grievance and
vexation of the people.

VII. And whereas also by authority of parliament, in the five
and twentieth year of the reign of King Edward III, it is declared
and enacted, that no man shall be forejudged of life or limb against
the form of the Great Charter and the law of the land ; and by the
said Great Charter and other the laws and statutes of this your
realm, no man ought to be adjudged to death but by the laws estab-
lished in this your realm, either by the customs of the same realm,
or by acts of parliament : and whereas no offender of what kind
soever is exempted from the proceedings to be used, and punish-
ments to be inflicted by the laws and statutes of this your realm ;
nevertheless of late time divers commissions under your Majesty's
great seal have issued forth, by which certain persons have been
assigned and appointed commissioners with power and authority to
proceed within the land, according to the justice of martial law
against such soldiers or mariners, or other dissolute persons joining
with them, as should commit any murder, robbery, felony, mutiny,
or other outrage or misdemeanor whatsoever, and by such summary
course and order as is agreeable to martial law, and, as is used in
armies in time of war, to proceed to the trial and condemnation of
such offenders, and them to cause to be executed and put to death
according to the law martial.

VIII. By pretext whereof some of your Majesty's subjects have
been by some of the said commissioners put to death, when and
where, i£ by the laws and statutes of the land they have deserved
death, by the same laws and statutes also they might, and by no
other ought to have been judged and executed.

IX. And also sundry grievous offenders, by colour thereof claim-
ing an exemption, have escaped the punishments due to them by
the laws and statutes of this your realm, by reason that divers of
your officers and ministers of justice have unjustly refused or for-
borne to proceed against such offenders according to the same laws
and statutes, upon pretence that the said offenders were punishable
only by martial law, and by authority of such commissions as
aforesaid ; which commissions and all other of like nature are
wholly and directly contrary to the said laws and statutes of this
your realm.

X. They do therefore humbly pray your most excellent Majesty,

386 ■ APPENDIX C.

that no man hereafter he compelled to make or yield any gift, loan,
benevolence, tax, or such like charge, without common consent by
act of parliament ; and that none be called to make answer, or
take such oath, or to give attendance, or be confined, or otherwise
molested or disquieted concerning the same or for refusal thereof ;
and that no freeman, in any such manner as is before mentioned,
be imprisoned or detained ; and that your Majesty would be pleased
to remove the said soldiers and mariners, and that your people may
not be so burdened in time to -come ; and that the aforesaid com-
missions, for proceeding by martial law, may be revoked and
annulled ; and that hereafter no commissions of like nature may
issue forth to any person or persons whatsoever to be executed as
aforesaid, lest by colour of them any of your Majesty's subjects be
destroyed or put to death contrary to the laws and franchise of the
land.

XI. All which they most humbly pray of your most excellent
Majesty as their rights and liberties, according to the laws and
statutes of this realm ; and that your Majesty would also vouchsafe
to declare, that the awards, doings, and proceedings, to the preju-
dice of your people in any of the premises, shall not be drawn here-
after into consequence or example ; and that your Majesty would
be also graciously pleased, for the further comfort and safety of
your people, to declare your royal will and pleasure, IJiat in the
things aforesaid all your officers and ministers shall iserve you
according to the laws and statutes of this realm, as they tender the
honour of your Majesty, and the prosperity of this kingdom.

Qua quidem petitione lecta et plenius intellecta per dictum domi-
rmm regem taliter est responsum in pleno parliamento, viz. Soil
droit fait come est desire. Statutes of the Eealm, v. 24, 25.

APPENDIX C.

THE BILL OF RIGHTS.

A.D. 1689. 1 Will. & Mar. Scss. 2, o. 2.

Whereas the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons,
assembled at Westminster, lawfully, fully, and freely representing
all the estates of the people of this realm, did, upon the thirteenth

APPENDIX C. 387

day of February, in the year Of our Lord one thousand six hundred
eighty-eight, present unto their Majesties, then called and known
by the names and style of William and Mary, Prince and Princess
of Orange, being present in their proper persons, a certain declara-
tion in writing, made by the said Lords and Commons, in the words
following ; viz : —

Whereas the late King, James II, by the assistance of diverse
evil counsellors, judges, and ministers employed by him, did
endeavour to subvert and extirpate the Protestant religion, and the
laws and liberties of this kingdom : —

1. By assuming and exercising a power of dispensing with and
suspending of laws, and the execution of laws, without consent of
Parliament.

2. By committing and prosecuting divers worthy prelates, for
humbly petitioning to be excused from concurring to the same
assumed power.

3. By issuing and causing to be executed a commission under
the Great Seal for erecting a court, called the Court of Commission-
ers for Ecclesiastical Causes.

4. By levying money for and to the use of the Crown, by pre-
tence of prerogative, for other time, and in other manner than the
same was granted by Parliament.

5. By raising and keeping a standing army vrithin this kingdom
in time of peace, without consent of Parliament, and quartering sol-
diers contrary to law.

6. By causing several good subjects, being Protestants, to be
disarmed, at the same time when Papists were both armed and
employed contrary to law.

7. By violating the freedom of election of members to serve in
Parliament.

8. By prosecutions in the Court of King's Bench, for matters
and causes cognizable only in Parliament ; and by diverse other
arbitrary and illegal courses.

9. And whereas of late years, partial, corrupt, and unqualified
persons have been returned and served on juries in trials, and par-
ticularly diverse jurors in trials for high treason, which were not
freeholders.

10. And excessive bail hath been required of persons committed
in criminal cases, to elude the benefit of the laws made for the lib-
erty of the subjects.

11. And excessive fines have been imposed ; and illegal and
cruel punishments inflicted.

388 APPENDIX C.

12. And several grants^ and promises made of fines and forfeit-
ures before any conviction or judgment against the persons upon
vrhom the same were to be levied.

All which are utterly and directly contrary to the known laws
and statutes, and freedom of this realm.

And whereas the said late King James II having abdicated the
government, and the throne being thereby vacant, his Highness,
the Prince of Orange (whom it hath pleased Almighty God to make
the glorious instrument of delivering this kingdom from popery and
arbitrary power) did (by the advice of the Lords Spiritual and
Temporal, and divers principal persons of the Commons) cause let
ters to be written to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, being Prot-
estants, and other letters to the several counties, cities, imiversi-
ties, boroughs, and cinque ports, for the choosing of such persons
as represent them, as were of right to be sent to Parliament, to
meet and sit at Westminster upon the two-and-twentieth day of
January, in this year one thousand six hundred eighty and eight, in
order to such an establishment, as that their religion, laws and lib-
erties might not again be in danger of being subverted ; upon which
letters, elections have been accordingly made.

And thereupon the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and
Commons, pursuant to their respective letters and elections, being
now assembled in a full and free representation of this nation,
taking into their most serious consideration the best means for
attaining the ends aforesaid, do in the first place (as their ancestors
in like case have usually done), for the vindicating and asserting
their ancient rights and liberties, declare : —

1. That the pretended power of suspending of laws, or the execu-
tion of laws, by regal authority, without consent of parliament, is
illegal.

2. That the pretended power of dispensing with laws, or the
execution of laws by regal authority, as it hath been assumed and
exercised of late, is illegal.

3. That the commission for erecting the late Court of Commis-
sioners for Ecclesiastical causes, and all other commissions and
courts of like nature, are illegal and pernicious.

4. That levying money for or to the use of the Crown, by
pretence of prerogative, without grant of parliament, for longer time
or in other manner than the same is or shall be granted, is illegal.

5. That it is the right of the subjects to petition the king, and
all commitments and prosecutions for such petitioning are illegal.

APPENDIX C. 389

6. That the raising or keeping a standing army within the king-
dom in time of peace, unless it he with consent of parliament, is
against law.

7. That the suhjects which are Protestants may have arms for
their defence suitable to their conditions, and as allowed by law.

8. That election of members of parliament ought to be free.

9. That the freedom of speech, and debates of proceedings in
parliament, ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court
or place out of parliament.

10. That excessive bail ought not to be required, nor excessive
fines imposed ; nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

11. That jurors ought to be duly impanelled and returned, and
jurors which pass upon men in trials for high treason ought to be
freeholders.

12. That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of par-
ticular persons before conviction, are illegal and void.

13. And that for redress of all grievances and for the amend-
ing, strengthening, and preserving of the laws, parliament ought
to be held frequently.

And they do claim, demand, and insist upon all and singular
the premises, as their undoubted rights and liberties ; and that no
declarations, judgments, doings, or proceedings, to the prejudice of
the people in any of the said premises, ought in any wise to be
drawn hereafter into consequence or example.

To which demand of their rights they are particularly encouraged
by the declaration of his Highness the Prince of Orange, as being
the only means for obtaining a full redress and remedy therein.

Having therefore an entire confidence that his said Highness
the Prince of Orange wUl perfect the deliverance so far advanced
by him, and wUl still preserve them from the violation of their
rights, which they have here asserted, and from all other attempts
upon their religion, rights, and liberties ;

II. The said Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons,
assembled at Westminster, do resolve, that William and Mary,
Prince and Princess of Orange, be, and be declared. King and Queen
of England, Prance, and Ireland, and the dominions thereunto
belonging, to hold the Crown and royal dignity of the said King-
doms and dominions to them the said Prince and Princess during
their lives, and the life of the survivor of them ; and that the sole
and full exercise of the regal power be only in, and executed by^
the said Prince of Orange, in the names of the said Prince and

390 APPENDIX C.

Princess, during their joint lives ; and after their deceases, the
said Crown and royal dignity of the said kingdoms and dominions
to be to the heirs of the body of the said Princess ; and for default
of such issue to the Princess Anne of Denmark, and the heirs of
her body ; and for default of such issue to the heirs of the body
of the said Prince of Orange. And the Lords Spiritual and
Temporal, and Commons, do pray the said Prince and Princess to
accept the same accordingly.

III. And that the oaths hereafter mentioned be taken by all
persons of whom the oaths of allegiance and supremacy might be
required by law, instead of them ; and that the said oaths of
allegiance and supremacy be abrogated.

I, A. B-., do sincerely promise and swear. That I will be faithful
and bear true allegiance to their Majesties King William and
Queen Mary: So help me Gon.

I, A. B., do swear. That, I do from my heart abhor, detest, and
abjure as impious and heretical, that damnable doctrine and
position, that Princes excommunicated or deprived by the Pope, or
any authority of the See of Rome, may be deposed or murdered
by their subjects, or any other whatsoever. And' I do declare.
That no foreign prince, person, prelate, state, or potentate, hath, or
ought to have, any jurisdiction, power, superiority, pre-eminence,
or authority ecclesiastical or spiritual, within this realm :

So HELP ME God.

IV. Upon which their said Majesties did accept the Crown and
royal dignity of the kingdoms of England, France, and Ireland,
and the dominions thereunto belonging, according to the resolution
and desire of the said Lords and Commons contained in the said
declaration.

V. And thereupon their Majesties were pleased, that the said
Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, being the two
Houses of Parliament, should continue to sit, and with their
Majesties' royal concurrence make effectual provision for the
settlement of the religion, laws, and liberties of this kingdom, so
that the same for the future might not be in danger again of being
subverted; to which the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and
Commons, did agree and proceed to act accordingly.

VI. Now in pursuance of the premises, the said Lords Spiritual
and Temporal, and Commons, in parliament assembled, for the
ratifying, confirming, and establishing the said declaration, and

APPENDIX C. 391

the articles, clauses, matters, and things therein contained, by the
force of a law made in due form by authority of parliament, do
pray that it may be declared and enacted. That all and singular the
rights and liberties asserted and claimed in the said declaration, are
the true, ancient, and indubitable rights and liberties of the people
of this kingdom, and so shall be esteemed, allowed, adjudged,
deemed, and taken to be, and that all and every the particulars
aforesaid shall be firmly and strictly holden and observed, as they
are expressed in the said declaration ; and all officers and ministers
whatsoever shall serve their Majesties and their successors accord-
ing to the same in all times to come.

VII. And the same Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Com-
mons, seriously considering how it hath pleased Almighty God, in
his marvellous providence, and merciful goodness to this nation, to
provide and preserve their said Majesties' royal persons most hap-
pily to reign over us upon the throne of their ancestors, for which
they render unto Him from the bottom of their hearts their hum-
blest thanks and praises, do truly, firmly, assuredly, and in the
sincerity of their hearts, think, and do hereby recognize, acknowl-
edge, and declare, that King James II having abdicated the gov-
ernment and their Majesties having accepted the Crown and royal
dignity aforesaid, their said Majesties did become, were, are, and
of right ought to be, by the laws of this realm, our sovereign liege
Lord and Lady, King and Queen of England, France, and Ireland,
and the dominions thereunto belonging, in and to whose princely
persons the royal State, Crown, and dignity of the same realms,
with all honours, styles, titles, regalities, prerogatives, powers,
jurisdictions and authorities to the same belonging and appertain-
ing, are most fully, rightfully, and entirely invested and incorpo-
rated, united, and annexed.

Vni. And for preventing all questions and divisions in this
realm, by reason of any pretended titles to the Crown, and for pre-
serving a certainty in the succession thereof, in and upon which
the unity, peace, tranquillity, and safety of this nation, doth, under
God, wholly consist and depend, the said Lords Spiritual and Tem-
poral, and Commons, do beseech their Majesties that it may be
enacted, established, and declared, that the Crown and regal gov-
ernment of the said kingdoms and dominions, with all and singular
the premises thereunto belonging and appertaining, shall be and
continue to their said Majesties, and the survivor of them, during
their lives, and the life of the survivor of them. And that the

392 APPENDIX C.

entire, perfect, and full exercise of tlie regal power and government
be only in, and executed by, his Majesty, in the names of both
their Majesties during their joint hves ; and after their deceases the
said Crown and premises shall be and remain to the heirs of the
body of her Majesty : and for default of such issue, to her Eoyal
Highness the Princess Anne of Denmark, and the heirs of her
body : and for default of such issue, to the heirs of the body of his
said Majesty : and thereunto the said Lords Spiritual and Tempo-
ral, and Commons, do, in the name of all the people aforesaid,
most humbly and faithfully submit themselves, their heirs and pos-
terities, forever: and do faithfully promise. That they will stand
to, maintain, and defend their said Majesties, and also the hmita-
tion and succession of the Crown herein specified and contained,
to the utmost of their powers, with their lives and estates, against
all persons whatsoever that shall attempt anything to the contrary.

IX. And whereas it hath been found by experience, that it is
inconsistent with the safety and welfare of this Protestant Mng-
dom, to be governed by a Popish prince, or by any king or queen
marrying a Papist, the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and
Commons, do further pray that it may be enacted, That aU and
every person and persons that is, are or shall be reconciled to, or
shall hold communion with, the See or Church of Home, or shall
profess the Popish religion, or shall marry a Papist, shall be
excluded and be forever incapable to inherit, possess, or enjoy the
Crown and government of this realm, and Ireland, and the domin-
ions thereunto belonging, or any part of the same, or to have, use,
or exercise any regal power, authority, or jurisdiction within the
same ; and in all and every such case or cases, the people of these
realms shall be and are hereby absolved of their allegiance ; and the
said Crown and government shall from time to time descend to,
and be enjoyed by, such person or persons, being Protestants, as
should have inherited and enjoyed the same, in case the said per-
son or persons so reconciled, holding communion, or professing, or
marrying as aforesaid, were naturally dead.

X. And that every king and queen of this realm, who at any
time hereafter shall come to and succeed in the Imperial Crown
of this kingdom, shall, on the first day of the meeting of the first
parliament, next after his or her coming to the Crown, sitting in
his or her throne in the House of Peers, in the presence of the Lords
and Commons therein assembled, or at his or her coronation,
before such person or persons who shall administer the coronation

APPENDIX C. 393

oath to him or her, at the time of his or her taking the said oath
(which shall first happen), make, subscribe, and audibly repeat
the declaration mentioned in the statute made in the thirteenth
year of the reign of King Charles II iatituled 'An Act for the
more effectual preserving the King's person and government, by
disabling Papists from sitting in either House of Parliament.' But
if it shall happen, that such king or queen, upon his or her succes-
sion to the crown of this realm, shall be under the age of twelve
years, then every such king or queen shall make, subscribe, and
audibly repeat the said declaration at his or her coronation, or the
first day of meeting of the first parliament as aforesaid, which shall
first happen after such king or queen shaU have attained the said
age of twelve years.

XI. All which their Majesties are contented and pleased shall
be declared, enacted, and established by authority of this present
parliament, and shall stand, remain, and be the law of this realm
forever ; and the same are by their said Majesties, by and with the
advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Com-
mons, in parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same,
declared, enacted, or established accordingly.

XII. And be it further declared and enacted by the authority
aforesaid, That from and after this present session of parliament,
no dispensation by non obstante of or to any statute, or any part
thereof, shall be allowed, but the same shall be held void and of no
effect, except a dispensation be allowed of in such statute, and
except in such oases as shall be specially provided for by one or
more bill or bills, to be passed during this present session of parlia-
ment.

XIII. Provided that no charter, or grant, or pardon granted
before the three and twentieth day of October, in the year of our
Lord One thousand six hundred eighty-nine, shall be any ways
impeached or invalidated by this act, but that the same shall be
and remain of the same force and effect in law, and no other, than
as if this act had never been made. — Statutes of the Kealm, vi.
142-145.

APPENDIX D.

A SUMMARY OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED
STATES.

The Constitution is in seven articles. The first article relates
to the organization and powers of Congress, which consists of a
Senate and House of Representatives. Representatives are to be
inhabitants of the State for which they are chosen, to be twenty-
five years old at least, and are to serve two years. Each House of
Representatives thus lasts two years, and this period is usually
known as a Congress : the fiftieth Congress expired March 4, 1889,
having completed the first century of the Constitution. Represen-
tatives are assigned to States in proportion to the population, and
this fact forced the provision for a decennial census, the first
appearance of such a provision in modem national history. Be-
sides the Representatives from the States, a few delegates from the
Territories have seats in Congress, possessing the right to debate
but not to vote. The House elects its Speaker and other officers,
and has the power of impeachment.

The legislature of each State elects two Senators, to serve for
six years ; and no State can be deprived of its equal share of repre-
sentation, except by its own consent. The Senators are divided
into three classes, the term of one class expiring every two years.
Senators are to be at least thirty years old, and must be inhabitants
of the States from which they are chosen, and citizens of the United
States for at least nine years previous to their election. The Vice-
President presides over the Senate, having no vote unless in case
of an equal division.

All officers of the United States are open to impeachment by the
House of Representatives, the impeachment to be tried by the
Senate, and the penalty to be no more than removal, and disquali-
fication to serve further under the United States. When the
President is tried, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court presides.

APPENDIX D. 396

The members of both Houses are privileged from arrest and
from being questioned elsewhere for words spoken in debate. Each
House passes on the election of its own members ; but an Act of
Congress may control the Acts of the State Legislature as to time,
place, and manner of elections, except as to the place of choosing
Senators, in which the Legislature remains supreme. The two
Houses cannot adjourn to another place, or for more than three
days, unless by common consent. Their members are paid by the
United States, and must not be office-holders or receive any office
created or increased in pay during their term of service in Congress.

When a bill passes both Houses it goes to the President. If he
signs it, it becomes law. If he holds it without signing for ten days
(Sundays excepted) it becomes law, unless the final adjournment
of Congress comes in the ten days. If the President decides to
veto a bill he returns it, with a statement of his objections, to the
House in which it originated. It can then only become law by the
vote of two- thirds of both Houses.

The powers of Congress are : to lay and collect taxes, duties,
imposts, and excises ; to borrow money ; to regulate foreign and
domestic commerce ; to make rules for naturalization and baiik-
ruptcy laws ; to coin money, regulate the value of foreign coins,
and fix the standard of weights and measures ; to punish the coun-
terfeiting of Federal securities and current coin ; to establish post-
offices and post-roads ; to establish patent and copyright systems ;
to establish courts inferior to the Supreme Court; to punish
offences on the high seas or against international law ; to declare
war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules for
captures ; to raise and support armies, no appropriation to be for
more than two years ; to provide and maintain a navy ; to make
articles of war ; to use the militia of the States in executing Federal
laws, suppressing insurrections and repelling invasions ; to provide
for organizing, arming, and disciplining this militia, leaving the
States to appoint the officers and carry out the system ; to establish
a national capital or Federal district, and to exercise exclusive
powers of legislation over it, and over sites for forts, dock-yards,
etc., bought by permission of the States ; and finally, to make all
laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execu-
tion the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this
Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any
department or office thereof.

The following prohibitions must also be noted: The Federal

396 APPENDIX D.

GoTemment shall not suspend the privilege of the writ of habeas
corpus except in case of rebellion or invasion, when the public
safety requires it. Congress must not pass any bill of attainder
or ex post facto lavy, tax exports, give commercial preference to the
ports of one State over those of another, lay direct taxes except in
proportion to census population, or grant any title of nobility.
Money is to be taken from the treasury only in consequence of
appropriations made by lavr. And no person in the service of the
tJnited States may accept any gift or title from a foreign power
without consent of Congress. The States are forbidden to make
treaties, to grant letters of marque and reprisal, to coin money, to
emit bills of credit, to make anything but silver a legal tender, to
grant any title of nobility, to pass a bill of attainder, ex post facto
law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts. They are for-
bidden (except by consent of Congress) to lay any duties on
imports or exports, except inspection charges, to be paid into the
Federal treasury ; to lay any tonnage duties ; to keep troops (a
word which does not cover militia) or ships in peace ; to make any
agreement with another State or with a foreign power ; or to engage
in war unless actually invaded.

The President is to be a native citizen, at least thirty-five years
old, and at least fourteen years a resident within the United States.
He is paid by the United States ; and his salary is not to be
increased or diminished by Congress, during his term. He is sworn
to execute his of&ce faithfully, and to preserve, protect, and defend
the Constitution of the United States. In case of his death, resig-
nation, or inability (by impeachment or otherwise), the Vice-
President succeeds him ; and in case of the inabOity of both, the
members of the Cabinet succeed in a prescribed order (according
to the Presidential Succession Act of 1886). The President has
the veto power already described, sends messages to Congress on
the state of the Union or on special subjects, convenes either House
or both on extraordinary occasions, receives foreign envoys, com-
missions officers of the United States, and oversees the execution
of the laws passed by Congress. He makes treaties ; but no treaty
is valid unless passed by the Senate by a two-thirds vote of those
present. He appoints ministers and consuls, judges, and all other
officers whose appointment Congress has not vested in other
officers ; but presidential appointments must be confirmed by the
Senate, though the President may make temporary appointments
during the recess of the Senate, to hold until the end of their next

APPENDIX D. 397

session. He is commander-in-chief of the army and navy, and
has power of pardon or reprieve for offences against Federal laws,
except in case of impeachment. And he may call on each head of
a department for an opinion in writing on any subject relating to
his department. The last clause has evolved the Cabinet, a term
not known in the Constitution. When Congress has by law organ-
ized a department, its leading officer is called its Secretary. There
are now eight departments, — those of state, of the treasury, of
war, of the navy, of the postoffice, of the interior, of justice, and
of agriculture. The Secretaries are selected by the President and
are confirmed: by the Senate, but are not responsible to any one
but the President. Nor is he bound by their individual opinions,
or even by a unanimous opinion from one of their periodical meet-
ings. They are his advisers only.

The people have no direct vote in the choice of President and
Vice-President : they choose Electors, each State having as many
Electors as it has Senators and Kepresentatives together ; and the
Electors choose the President and Vice-President. The Electors
are to be chosen in such manner as the Legislature of each State
shall direct ; and this plenary power of the Legislatures was the
source of the unhappy disputed election of 1876-7. Until 1887
Congress refused to provide for necessary proof of the State's
action, and claimed the power to provide from time to time for
emergencies. Now, provision is made by the Electoral Count Act
of 1887, for the State's certification of its votes ; and the certificate
which comes in legal form is not to be rejected but by a vote of
both Houses. If there is no majority of electoral votes for Presi-
dent, the House of Representatives chooses one from the three
names highest on the list, each State having one vote. The
Electors were meant to exercise perfect freedom of choice, an
intention at present completely frustrated.

The Constitution provides for one Supreme Court, having original
jurisdiction in cases affecting foreign ministers and consuls, and
those to which a State shall be a party, and appellate jurisdiction
from such subordinate Courts as Congress shall from time to time
establish. Judges are to hold office during good behavior, and their
salaries are not to be diminished during their continuance in office.
Pederal Courts deal with all cases in law or equity arising under
the Constitution, or the laws of treaties made under it ; with all
cases affecting public ministers and consuls, or admiralty or mari-
time law ; with suits by or against the United States ; and with

398 APPENDIX D^

suits by one State against another, by a State against citizens of
another State, by a citizen of one State against a citizen of another,
by a citizen of a State against citizens of his own State when the
question is one of a grant of land from different States, by a State
or its citizens against foreigners, or by a foreigner against an
American. The Supreme Covurt now consists of a Chief Justice
and eight Associate Justices ; below this there are nine Circuit
Courts, each consisting of a Supreme Court Justice and a Circuit
Judge ; and fifty-six District Courts, each with a District Judge.
Each Circuit comprises several States ; and the Supreme Court
Justices, in addition to their Circuit work, meet in bank annually
in Wasliington. The Districts cover each a State, or a part of a
State. The Federal Courts are the principal agent in securing the
power of the national government over individuals ; and a' most
important agent in securing to the national government its su-
premacy over the States. A most important provision of the
Constitution is the grant of jurisdiction to Federal Courts in cases
involving the construction of the Constitution, or of laws or treaties
made under it. It was not until 1816 that the right of the Federal
Courts to exercise this power was clearly established, and the
Constitution thus became what it professed to be, "the supreme
law of the land."

The States are bound to give credit to the public records of
other States, to accord citizenship to the citizens of other States,
to return criminals fleeing from other States, and to return "per-
sons held to service or labor" under the laws of another State.
The Federal government is to guarantee a republican form of
government to each of the States, and to protect each of them
against invasion, or, on application of the Legislature or Governor,
against domestic violence. The Constitution provides that it is to
go into force as soon as nine of the thirteen States shall ratify it,
and that any future amendment, when passed by two-thirds of
both Houses, and ratified by the Xiegislatures or conventions of
three-fourths of the States, shall become a part of the Constitution.
By application of the Legislatures of two-thirds of the States, a new
convention^ like that which framed the Constitution, may take the
place of the two Houses of Congress in proposing amendments.

Ten amendments were adopted so soon after the ratification of
the Constitution that they may fairly be considered a part of the
original instrument. They were due to a general desire for a
"Bill of Eights." They state expressly the general principle

APPENDIX E. 399

already given, that the Federal government is restricted to granted
powers, while those not mentioned are reserved "to the States
respectively or to the people." Somewhat later came the Xlth
Amendment, affecting the judicial power, and the Xllth affecting
the Electoral College. By the Xinth, XlVth, and XVth, adopted
since the Civil War, slavery was swept away, national authority
magnified against State assumption, and the right to vote secured
to aU citizens without account " of race, color, or previous condition
of servitude."

The Constitution was meant only as a schenlt in outline, to be
filled up afterwards and from time to time, by legislation. The
idea is most plainly carried out in the Federal justiciary ; but it is
visible in every department. It has carried the Constitution safely
through a century which has radically altered every other civUized
government. The members of the convention of 1787 showed their
wisdom most plainly in not trying to do too much; if they had
done more they would have done less.

APPENDIX E.

SUMMARY OF THE CONSTITUTION OF CANADA.

The Dominion of Canada consists of the seven federated Prov-
inces, — Quebec, Nova Scotia, New 'Brunswick, Prince Edward's
Island, Ontario, Manitoba, and British Columbia, together with
vast unorganized territories.

In accordance with the provisions of the British North American
Act of 1867, which regulates the Constitution of Canada, the
Imperial Parliament bestows upon the Dominion a government
controlled by a Parliament, consisting of the Governor-General as
representative of the Queen of England, a Senate, and a House of
Commons. The appointment of a Governor- General and of a
Commander-in-chief of the military and naval forces of Canada
are the only exercise of authority in Canadian affairs beyond the
control of the Canadian Parliament ; and the one reminder left to
show that the age of colonial tutelage is not entirely outgrown.

The Senate comprises seventy-eight membei^s. Each Senator

400 APPENDIX E.

must be at least thirty years old, a natiYe-bom or naturalized sub-
ject of Great Britain, and the possessor of property in Ms own
Province to the value of ^4000, over and above his debts and lia^
bilities. Appointment to the Senate rests nominally with the
Crown, but virtually with the ministry of the Dominion ; for under
"responsible government," the premier pro tern, governs. Senar
torial appointments are for life unless the appointee resigns, turns
traitor, becomes banirupt, or forswears allegiance to the Crovra
of England.!

The number oP members in the House of Commons is not fixed
definitely, as in the membership of the Upper House, but varies
vrith the returns of the decennial census. Quebec has sixty-five
members in the Commons, and this number remains the same
whatever may be the change of population in that Province ; and
the proportion this number of members bears to the number of the
population of Quebec, after the census of that Province is taken,
determines the members to be returned by the whole country ; as
each Province is entitled to send members to Parhament in the
same ratio to its number of inhabitants that sixty-five bears to the
population of the Province of Quebec. At present Quebec has a
member for every 20,900 of her population; the other Provinces
have members in the same proportion, except certain less populous
Provinces that were specially excepted. The total number of
Eepresentatives at present is two hundred and ten. The voting
for members of Parliament is by ballot, practically almost every
owner or occupant of a house possessing the suffrage.

The Governor-General, like the constitutional sovereign he repre-
sents, keeps aloof from party in the state. He governs solely
through his Ministers, who are his advisers ; and so long as they
have a majority of the people's Eepresentatives at their back, he
must hearken to their counsel. In this he has no choice. In the
most extreme case, the utmost stretch of his authority only permits
him to exercise the royal prerogative, dismiss his Ministers, dissolve
the Parliament, and obtain a new expression of the wiU of the
people. In a constitutional way, as advised by the Ministry, he
speaks as with the voice of the nation ; were he to speak otherwise,
his words would have no authority. Each Minister of the Crown

1 The Senate of Canada, like the Upper Houses in general of the British
Empire, is weak. A tendency prevails in the Empire to exchange the nominated
for elective Upper Houses; sometimes the Upper House is dispensed with
entirely. Dilke: Problems of Greater Britain, p. 606.

APPENDIX E. 401

is required to have a seat in Parliament ; as tlie Lower House
controls the finance, the Ministers of the more important depart-
ments are generally members of that House, in order there fully
to explain the operations of their departments.

The public business controlled by the Dominion government is
transacted through thirteen departments, each of which is con-
trolled by a member of the Ministry. 1. The Interior ; 2. Finance ;
3. Public Works; 4. State; 5. Railways and Canals; 6. Agricul-
ture ; 7. Postal-service ; 8. Justice ; 9. Marine and Fisheries ;
10. Customs ; 11. Inland Revenue ; 12. MiUtia and Defence ;
13. That of President of the Council. The branches of public
business coming under control of the Dominion government are :
management of trade, commerce, indirect taxation, and the public
debt ; postal-service ; the census and statistics ; militia and defence ;
payment of public officers ; lighthouses, navigation, shipping, and
quarantine ; fisheries ; currency, banking, coinage, and legal tender ;
weights and measures ; bankruptcy ; patents and inventions ;
naturalization laws and laws of divorce ; penitentiaries and crimi-
nal law ; railways, canals, and telegraphs, if extending beyond the
limits of a single Province ; and, in general, " such classes of sub-
jects as are expressly excepted in the enumeration of the classes
of subjects, by this Act exclusively assigned to the Legislatures of
the Provinces."

A Lieutenant-Governor for each Province is appointed by the
Dominion government. Each Province, moreover, has a Legisla-
ture : in Ontario, Manitoba, and British Columbia, the Legislature
consists of a single chamber of Representatives, elected by a broad
sufErage. The remaining Provinces have, besides the popular
chamber, an Upper House : the Upper House, in the case of Prince
Edward's Island, like the popular chamber, is elective ; while in
the case of Quebec, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, it is nomi-
nated. Each Province is left to itself to regulate such affairs as
concern itself solely ; viz., the management of its public lands, the
appointment of officers of justice, except judges (who are appointed
by the Dominion government); education; asylums, hospitals, and
charities ; jails, prisons, and reformatories, except penitentiaries ;
municipal institutions ; shop, tavern, and other licenses ; local
works ; the solemnization of marriages ; property and civil rights ;
administration of justice in provincial courts, both of civil and
criminal jurisdiction ; the appointment of magistrates and justices-
of-the-peace ; emigration so far as concerns provincial lands ; and

402 APPENDIX E.

generally all matters of a merely local and private nature. No
Province has the power to organize or maintain a military force ;
and the Dominion government has the power to disallow any
enactments of the local Legislatures which are ultra vires. In each
Province the Lieutenant-Governor has his Ministry, who cannot
remain in office unless sustained hy a majority of the Representa-
tives of the people. The machinery of government is directly
responsive to puhhc opinion. Publicists, hoth English and Ameri-
can, have referred to the Canadian system as virtually one of the
most democratic in existence.

It is interesting to note that as regards local government, there
has been in Canada a complete revival of most ancient methods.
In the local government of Ontario, called by Sir Charles DUke the
best in the world, an elected Keeve and four deputies make up each
township council ; and the Reeves, each with his four, from all the
townships of a county, assembling, constitute together the County-
council, which thus reproduces the old shire-moot. In Quebec,
also, the County-council is made up of the Mayors of the munici-
palities ; but in Ontario and Manitoba the ancient name of Reeve
is used.i

The main difierence between the Constitutions of Canada and
the United States is that in Canada the central power is far
stronger. The Dominion Parliament keeps in its own hands the
criminal law and that of divorce, the appointment of judges, the
nomination of the Lieutenant-Governors of Provinces, the militia
system, — all of which belong in the United States to the separate
States. The Dominion has a veto, virtually exercised by the
Prime Minister, though in the name of the Crown, upon the legis-
lation of the Provinces. No such veto exists in the United States,
if the local laws are constitutional.

Sir Henry Parkes, premier of New South Wales, is authority
for the statement that the Constitution of Canada is to be the
model for federated Australia. ^

^ Problems of Greater Britain, p. 66, 2 Jbid., pp. 58, 59.

INDEX.

Adams, Brooks, in Atlantic Month-
ly, cited on the origin of the Con-
stitution of the United States
234.

Adams, Herbert B., in Johns Hop-
kins Historical and Political
Tracts, "The Germanic Origin
of New England Towns," cited
116, 276.

Adams, John, on the value of the
New England town-meeting, 284.

Adams, Samuel, life of, hy the
writer, quoted, on the " Coming
on of the American Revolution,"
199, etc. ; on the Americaji Tories,
227, etc. ; on the New England
town-meeting, 278, etc.

Addison, his " Remarks on Italy"
quoted on the political compe-
tency of the plain people, 334.

Jj^theling, an Anglo-Saxon noble,
5.

Agitators, lower council of the
army in 1647, 141.

"Agreement of the People," the
first, 1647, 141, etc. ; the second,
1649, 152, etc.

Alabama, local government in, 296.

Alfred, King, his conservative in-
stincts and influence, 21.

Allen, W. F., on the government
of American cities, 299.

America, discovered at a critical
period for Anglo-Saxon freedom,
93 (see United States).

Anburey, his " Travels " cited on
leadership of Massachusetts in
American Revolution, 216.

Anglo-Saxons, their primitive home
and condition, 2, etc. ; their con-
quest of Britain, 15, etc. ; their

conversion to Christianity, 19;
development of their polity, 20,
etc. ; influence upon them of the
Danes, 22, 23 ; their array at Hast-
ings, 31, 32; their prowess, 34;
their overthrow by the Normans,
35.
Anglo-Saxon freedom, characteris-
tics of, 4, etc. ; why valuable,
views of John Stuart Mill and J .
Toulmin Smith, 12, etc.; its de-
pression under Edward the Con-
fessor, 23 ; its submergence at the
Norman conquest, 38; to some
extent restored through Magna
Charta, 51 ; contended for by Wat
Tyler and the peasants in the
14th century, 77; by Jack Cade
and his followers in the 15th cen-
tury, 89 ; on the point of perish-
ing under Tudor rule, 93; and
under Stuart rule, 109; thor-
oughly revived by the Indepen-
dents in 1647, 140, etc. ; depressed
once more at the Restoration, 163 ;
the American Revolution, an ef-
fort for its vindication, 230; es-
tablished and formulated in the
Constitution of the United States,
232, etc. ; its educative power con-
sidered by Sir T. E. May, 259; by
J. Toulmin Smith, 260; restored
to England and her dependencies
since Reform Bill of 1832 and its
successors, 263, etc.; adopted in
part by Europe in general, 271;
possibility of its adoption in In-
dia, 272 ; to be administered only
by Anglo-Saxon men, 272, 273,
also 308 ; destined for the domin-
ion of the world, 308, etc.; love

404

IHDEX.

for it ol the plain people, 327,
328 ; of the high-placed aud calti-
Tated, 328, etc. ; connection with
it of the high-placed and culti-
vated sometimes discreditable,
332, etc. ; importance of a spirit
of brotherhood among those in-
heriting it, 343, etc.

Anne, Queen, crisis at her death,
173.

Arnold, Sir Edwin, on the identity
of the English-speaking race, 317,
318.

Arnold, Matthew, on the identity
of the English-speaking race, 314 ;
on German " Corporalism," 331.

Australia, first accurately defined
by Captain James Cook, 247; pres-
ent condition of, 249; long used
as a prison, 265; possesses re-
sponsible government, 266; its
federation to be probably on the
Canadian model, 266 (note) ;
practically independent, 267 ; ex-
perience of, with large cities, 299 ;
embarrassments of, from danger
of Chinese encroachment, 322.

Bacon, Lord, his " Essays " cited,
on a narrowing of sympathies,
366.

Bagehot, his "English Constitu-
tion" cited, on changes in the
temper of Parliament under the
Tudors and Stuarts, 107 ; on the
fusion of the executive and legis-
lative powers in English govern-
ment, 242 (note) ; on England as a
"disguised republic," 256 (note).

Ball, John, his sermons to the peas-
ants in the 14th century, 74.

Bancroft, his " History of the
United States" cited on causes

' of American Revolution, 198; on
derivation of English Constitu-
tion from Anglo-Saxon sources,
213.

Bath, city of, as illustrating abuse
of borough representation in
18th century, 183.

Battle Abbey, present appearance
of, 29, etc.

Bayne, Peter, his " Chief Actors of
the Puritan Revolution" cited,
325.

Belgium, partially adopts Anglo-
Saxon freedom, 271.

Bemis, E. W., in Johns Hopkins
University Studies, cited, 288,
289, 296.

Bewdley, as illustrating abuses of
borough representation in 18th
century, 183.

Bill of Eights, passed by Parliar
ment, 1689, 167 ; luU text of. Ap-
pendix C.

Birmingham, city of, vmrepresented
in 18th century, 183.

Black Death, of 1348, its effect on
economic condition of England,
72.

Blackstone, his "Commentaries"
cited on Parliament's freedom
from restraint, 233.

Bluntschli, cited, on value of town-
meeting, 283.

Board of Trade, its mistaken policy
in 17th and 18th centuries, 199.

Borough, a more strictly organised
township,18; character and polity
of, in the Norman epoch, 45 ; . in-
significance of members for, in
the early Parliaments, misfor-
tunes of, 66; largeness of life
much curtailed in 15th century,
87; destruction of the franchise
in, 181; "rotten boroughs," 182;
their political degradation under
George III, 183 ; improved condi-
tion of, at the present time, 261.

Briglit, John, on England and
America as two nations, but one
people, 344.

Brotherhood of English-speaking
men, views of J. R. Seeley, 343;
of John Bright, of Sir Henry
Parkes, of Goldwin Smith, of Sir
George Grey, 344 ; of J. C. Firth,
345; of the Westminster Review,
reasons for its expediency, 346;

INDEX.

405

as keeping vivid Anglo-Saxon
traditions, 352; as securing An-
glo-Saxon ascendency, 354; as
leading toward a brotherhood of
the human race, 365, etc.

Browning, Oscar, his ' ' Modern Eng-
land" cited on the Reform Bill
of 1832, 253.

Brunswick, House of, of little mark,
but pledged to constitutional rule,
173.

Bryce, James, his " American Com-
monwealth " cited, 235, 237, 264,
271, 279, 298, 300, 315, 316, 332;
in Johns Hopkins University
Studies, 5th series, IX, 242.

Buckingham, as illustrating abuses
of borough representation in 18th
century, 183.

Buckle, his " History of Civilization
in England" cited on England
as saved by American resistance
in American Revolution, 225,
231.

Burgesses, House of, in Virginia,
120 ; its independent temper, 125.

Burke, Edmund, on importance of
preserving representative charac-
ter of House of Commons, 188;
his speech on the Stamp Act, 208 ;
his doctrine of representation,
211; his position as regards
America, 222; believes England
saved by American resistance,
222; opposes the radicals, 223;
consistent in opposing French
Revolution, 223 ; laments the fall
of the Bourbons, 252.

Bute, shire of, as illustrating abuses
of representation in 18th century,
185.

Cabinet, origin and importance of,
in the English polity, 174; its
great modern significance, 257.

Camden, Lord, Chief Justice of the
Common Pleas, his speech on the
Stamp Act, 209 ; his position not
that of the Colonies, 213; calls
Massachusetts the "ring-leading

colony " in American Revolution,
216.

Canada, why it remained to Eng-
land in American Revolution,
246; influence there of exiled
American Tories, 247; present
condition of, 249; long neglect
of, by the home government, 265 ;
becomes a federation with re-
sponsible government in 1867,
266 ; local self-government in, its
practical independence, 267 (and
note) ; difficulties before, 322 ;
summary of Constitution of. Ap-
pendix E.

Carlyle, his "Life and Letters of
Cromwell " cited, 161.

Carnegie, his " Triumphant De-
mocracy," 328.

Cass, Lewis, his influence in devel-
oping Michigan, 288.

Catharine II, of Russia, has ideas
of reform in 18th century, 251.

Ceorls, their equality in primitive
Anglo-Saxon society, 3; analo-
gous in condition to American
citizen, 9 ; they sink into villein-
age, 23.

Chamberlain, Mellen, cited, on the
legal status of the Thirteen Colo-
nies, 194 ; on causes of American
Revolution, 217; on the American
Revolution as a strife, not of
countries, but of parties, 220.

Chapter House, at Westminster,
first home of Parliament, 67.

Charles I, his arbitrary beginning,
107, 108 ; summons the Short and
the Long Parliament, 1640, 131;
his short-lived prudence, 133;
character of his party, 134, etc. ;
at Edgehill, 137 ; at Naseby, 138 ;
his duplicity in the hands of his
enemies, 139 ; denounced in Grand
Army Remonstrance, 148; his exe-
cution, 154.

Charles 11, King in Scotland, 1649,
157; restored to English throne,
1660, 163; benefits coming from
his bad character, 165.

406

INDEX.

Charters, colonial, originally incor-
porations of trading companies,
"perverted" into constitutions,
195, 234; of mediseval guilds,
their relation to the Rigid Con-
stitution, 234.

Chatham, Pitt, Earl of, his speech
on the Stamp Act, 208 ; his posi-
tion not that of the colonists, 213 ;
strongly their friend, believes
their cause that of the English
Whigs, 221; thought English free-
dom was saved by the American
Revolution, 222.

China, possible perils from, to An-
glo-Saxon freedom, 354, etc.

Christian, commentator on Black-
stone, cited, 232, 262.

Church, in early times protects the
people, 49, 94, 95; under Henry
VIII divorced from Rome and
made Anglican, 95; its subser-
viency under Henry VIII, 96,
97; sanctions the jvs divinum
under the Stuarts, 104 ; its char-
acter under Laud, 108 ; its devo-
tion to royalty at the Restoration,
163; at first sustains James II,
165; sides with the Tories, 170;
hostile to Reform Bill of 1832,
254.

Church, Alfred, his "Henry V"
cited, 83.

Cities, their satisfactory adminis-
tration in England, 261; their
size and multiplication in the
United States, 299; difficulties
of their government, 300, 301 ;
suggestions as to improvement
of, 302, etc. ; ideas as to, of Hon.
Seth Ik)w, 302, etc. ; grounds for
a hopeful view, 304, etc.

Civil War, English, breaks out
1642, the parties, 134, 136.

Cobden, on a reformed upper House
for Parliament, 261.

Coleridge, his early enthusiasm for
free ideas, 251.

Colonial exhibition of 1886, scene
at opening of, 269, 270; as an

illustration of the essential iden-
tity of English-speaking men,
318, etc.

Colonies, the Thirteen, their estab-
lishment in America, 110, etc.;
their condition in the middle of
the 18th century, 192, etc. ; they
claim to owe allegiance to King,
not Parliament, but are not con-
sistent, 190; the ecclesiastical
grievance, 197; the commercial
grievance, 198 ; their welfare sac-
rificed to English advantage, 200 ;
assert through Franklin, in 1766,
allegiance to King, but not Par-
liament, 202 ; doubt as to their
constitutional position, 202, 203;
effect upon, of fall of Quebec,
203; exasperated by GrenviUe's
policy, 204, etc. ; their position
not that of Pitt and Camden, 213 ;
superior in political wisdom to
the mother-country, 214; influ-
enced by a discreditable reason
partly, united by the Stamp Act
in resistance to England, 217;
patriots in, embarrassed by the
number of Tories, 225; become
the United States with small con-
stitutional change, 235 ; the new
colonial empire managed on dif-
ferent principles, 246; how con-
stituted, 246, etc., 264; Sir T.
Erskine May on freedom of, 268.

Comines, Philippe de, on English
parliamentary government in
15th century, 84.

Comitatus (see Gesith) .

Commercial class, rises in impor-
tance, for the most part non-
conformists, recruited by foreign
immigrants, 171 ; tends to plutoc-
racy, 175; its good influence
as regards freedom, 198; its
selfish treatment of the colonies,
199.

Commons, first represented in
national council in 13th century,
57; representation fully estab-
lished under Edward I, 60.

INDEX.

407

Commons, House of, definitely sep-
arated from House of Lords, 68 ;
becomes the active and aggres-
sive force of Parliament, 81;
ceases to be fairly representa-
tive, 85 ; its character depressed
by restriction of the franchise,
86; preponderates over House
of Lords under the Tudors, 98;
gains in spirit under Elizabeth,
103; journal of, cited, 150, 154;
abolishes kingship and House of
Lords, 1649, 164; its decline In
character during 18th century,
175; a majority of, returned by
154 ; individuals, 186 ; people de-
clare it not representative of
them, 189; furnishes model for
United States House of Repre-
sentatives, 240 ; worst corruption
of, in 1816, 252; supremacy of,
established in 1832, becomes then
truly representative, 255; its pres-
ent omnipotence in English poll-
ties, 262 (see also Parliament) .

Commonwealth, English, its birth,
career, and overthrow, 154, etc.

Congress, its resemblance to Par-
liament, 240, 241.

Connecticut, agreement of the
towns Hartford, Wethersfield,
and Windsor, as related to a
Rigid Constitution, 234.

Constitution, Federal, of the United
States, uniqueness of the idea,
232; its value in a polity, 233;
its origin, 234; its provisions of
English derivation, 235, 236;
the President the King of the
18th century, 238; Electoral
College borrowed from Holy
Roman Empire, 239; Congress
from Parliament, 240; Supreme
Court from English precedents,
241; admiration for, of Sir H.
Maine, 244; substantially un-
changed since 1789, 274; a sim-
ilar one some day expedient
for England, 263; enthusiastic
celebration of its centennial as in-

dicating respect for it, 327, 328;
summary of. Appendix D.

Convocation, assembly of the
Church, approves absolutism un-
der James I, 104.

Cook, Captain James, explores
coasts of Australasia, 247.

Coote, H. C, his "Romans of
Britain" cited, 16, 17 (note).

Coroner, elected in the shire-moot,
115.

Corruption, of Parliament, in 18th
century, 177, etc. ; in American
cities, 300, etc.; Dilke's hopeful
view as to its disappearance
in English-speaking world, 307
(note) .

Cortes, the national assembly of
Spain, 62; overthrown in 16th
century, 103.

Cotton and Payne, their " English
Colonization and Dependence"
quoted, 272.

County, unimportant in New Eng-
land, 118; important in Virginia,
its organization, 120; scene at
court of, 121; important in Penn-
sylvania, 127; not changed at
Revolution, 237 (see also Shire) .

County Councils, established in
England in 1888, significance of,
260.

County system, of local self-govern-
ment in America, 277; prevailed
until Civil War generally in the
South, 294, etc.

Cowell, his "Interpreter" advo-
cates jus divinum under James
I, 104.

Creighton, M., his " Simon de Mont-
fort" quoted, 58.

Cromwell, Oliver, named "Iron-
side " by Prince Rupert at Mars-
ton Moor, at Naseby, 138 ; at first
not in favor of popular govern-
ment, 144; reconciled with the
army December, 1647, 145; his
prowess in 1648, 147; his Irish
campaign, danger at Dunbar,
157; victorious there and at Wor-

408

INDEX.

cester, 158; becomes hostile to
the Rump, 159; dissolves it,
160; as Protector, 160; Milton's
panegyric upon, 161.
Curia Regis, King's Court under
the Norman and Angevin Sover-
eigns, 44.

Dakota, North and South, local
government in, 294.

Danes, effect of their incursions,
22, 23.

Declaration of Rights, 1688, 166,
167.

Deerfield, Franklin Co., Mass.,
town-meeting at, 279, etc.

De la Mare, Sir Peter, speaker of
the Good Parliament, 69.

Democracy (see Plain People).

Denmark, partially adopts Anglo-
Saxon freedom, 271.

De Tocqueville, on the Constitu-
tion, 232,241; on value of New
England town-meeting, 283, 284 ;
on feebleneijs of French coloniza-
tion, 288.

Dilke, Sir Charles, his " Problems
of Greater Britain " cited, 266,
267, 272, 299, 318, 328.

Dissenters (see Non-conformists).

Dobell, Sidney, his Sonnets quoted,
350.

Domesday Book, description of, 40,
41.

Dunbar, Cromwell's victory at, 158.

East India Company, chartered
1600, beginning of British domin-
ion in India, 111.

Eaton, Dormau B., cited, 188.

Edgehill, battle of, 1642, 137.

Edinburgh, restriction of the fran-
cUse in 18th century, 184.

Edward the Confessor, decay under
him of the Anglo-Saxon polity,
23.

Edward I, importance of his influ-
ence, 59; his character, 60 ; great
development under him of repre-
sentative government, 61.

Edward II, deposed by Parliament,
1327, 68.

Edward III, growth of power of
Parliament under, 69.

Edward IV, decay of power of Par-
liament under, 92.

Elbe, country near mouth of, the
primitive Anglo-Saxon home, de-
scribed, 2.

Electoral College, borrowed from
Holy Roman Empire for Federal
Constitution, a failure in prac-
tice, 239.

Eliot, President, of Harvard, on
the success of democracy, 336,
etc.

Elizabeth, accedes, 1558, rising
temper of Parliament under, 99 ;
her character and rule, 100; ef-
fect of her popularity, 102.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, on the
value of the New England town-
meeting, 284.

England, its germ in the ancient
Teutonic communities, 10; its un-
broken development to the pres-
ent day, 15 ; its fitness for repre-
sentative government in 1265, 54,
55; freedom preserved to it by
American Revolution, 222; its
masses pro-American in Ameri-
can Revolution, 224; its great-
ness apparently destroyed by loss
of the Thirteen Colonies, 245; ac-
quires at once a new colonial em-
pire, 246; much sympathy in, at
first, for the French Revolution,
251; reaction from this, 252; be-
comes in modern times practi-
cally a republic, 263 ; present em-
barrassments of, from the Irish
question, 322, 323; love in, for
Anglo-Saxon freedom, 328.

Earl, Anglo-Saxon noble, 5.

Farmers, rise of class of, in 14th
century, 71.

Feudalism, rise of, among the Sax-
ons, 22, 23; its Prankish and
Norman development, 39; estab-

INDEX.

409

lishment of the latter in Eng-
land, 40; iu full sway under Ste-
phen, 43.

Filmer, Sir Bobert, his absolutist
theories, 164.

Firth, J. C, of New Zealand, on a
coining brotherhood of English-
speaking men, 345; on the Chi-
nese, 355, 356.

Folk-moot (see Moot).

Fortesoue, Sir John, on Lancas-
trian England, 84, 179.

Fox, Charles James, believes Eng-
lish freedom preserved by Amer-
ican Revolution, 222; eulogizes
Montgomery, American general
killed at Quebec, 224; favors
parliamentary reform, 250; fa-
vors self-government in colonies,
264.

France, dying out in, of popular
freedom, 168; saves cause of the
colonies in American Revolution,
226; contrast between her con-
stitution-makers and those of
America, 236; rejoices in appar-
ent downfall of England iu
American Revolution, 245; ex-
cesses of Revolution in, arrest
the progress of reform in Eng-
land, 250, 251; partially adopts
Anglo-Saxon freedom, 271 ; insta
bility of her freedom, 353.

Franchise, right of, held by the
ceorls, 5; interfered with by in-
cipient feudalism, 23; possessed
as to local matters by the people,
under the Norman Kings, 52; pos-
sessed by the yeomen as to dic-
tion of knights-of-the-shire, 65;
greatly restricted in 1429, 86, 87 ;
people try to vindicate it under
Jack Cade, 90; broad franchise
proposed by the English Com-
monwealth, 153; causes of its
great limitation in the shires
after 1688, 179, 180; in the bor-
oughs, 181, 182 ; A. Bland, of Vir-
ginia, on, in Great Britain, 213;
its educative effect after 1832,

255 ; its extension in England at
present, 258.

Franklin, Benjamin, at the bar of
the House of Commons in 1766,
202.

Franks, their origin and polity, 38,
39.

Frederick II (Hohenstaufen) , insti-
tutes in Italy popular assemblies,
62.

Freedom (see Anglo-Saxon Free-
dom).

Free-laborers, rise of class of, 72.

Friends of the People, democratic
society at end of the 18th cen-
tury, 250.

Freeman, E. A., cited, 2, 7, 9, 10, 53,
86, 116, 118, 119, 256.

Froissart, his " Chronicles " on the
Peasant Rebellion in the 15th
century, 74.

Froude, on benefit to individuals
from unification of nations, 368.

Galloway, an American Tory, tes-
tifies in House of Commons as to
strength of his party, 226.

Galpin, S. A., in Walker's Statisti-
cal Atlas, cited, 276.

Gardiner, S. R., cited, 98, 133, 138,
152, 156.

George III, his education and char-
acter, 218, 219; his embarrass-
ments in dealing with the Thir-
teen Colonies, 221, etc.

George, Henry, on decay of the me-
diaeval yeomen, 135; his scheme
of land-holding a revival of the
primitive tenure, 262.

Germany, its partial adoption of
Anglo-Saxon freedom, 271; its
present greatness due rather to
its rulers than its people, 330,
331.

Gesith, retinue of the heretoga, 7 ;
gives rise to the thegns, 19.

Gladstone, concedes to America the
primacy among English-speaking
lands, 312 ; on jealousy and fear
of liberty at Oxford University,

410

INDEX.

333 ; on coming greatness of Eng-
land and Russia, 357.

Glasgow, restriction of franchise
in, in 18th century, 184.

Gneist, Rudolph, his constitutional
history cited, 2, 96, 162.

Godwin, William, his "History of
the Commonwealth" cited, 144.

Goethe, on a narrow national feel-
ing, 365.

Gordon, his " History of the Inde-
pendence of the United States,"
on a New England town-meeting,
117, 118.

Grace, ex-mayor of New York, on
municipal government, 302.

Grand Remonstrance, of the Long
Parliament, November, 1641, 133.

Grand Army Remonstrance, 1647,
147, etc.

Greeks, ignorant of representation,
7.

Green, John Richard, his " History
of the English People," " Short
History of the English People,"
and ' ' Making of England," cited,
3, 16, 68, 70, 75, 79, 84, 97, 105,
178, 189, 309.

Green, Thomas Hill, his " Works "
quoted on the results of the Eng-
lish Commonwealth, 162.

Grenville, George, enforces revenue
laws in the Thirteen Colonies,
204; believes the American cause
anti-Whig, 222.

Grey, Earl, supporter of the Re-
form Bill of 1832, 254.

Grey, Sir George, on a league of
the English-speaking race, 344.

GfUizot, his " History of the Eng-
lish Revolution," cited, 145; on
necessity to existence of the
United States, of preserving Eng-
lish traditions, 324.

Hallam, his " Middle Ages " cited;
7; his "Constitutional History"
cited, 164.

Hammond, Dr. W. G., denies pres-
ence of representation in early

Anglo-Saxon polity, 6 (note) ; on
the value of a Rigid Constitution,
233.

Hampden, John, parliamentary
leader in 1640, 131; his popular-
ity, his views, his death, 137.

Harold, his accession, 24; his em-
barrassments at Hastings, 28;
his appearance and character, 31 ;
his death, 35.

Hastings, present appearance of
battle-field of, importance of the
battle, 25.

Henrietta Maria, Queen of Charles
I, 132.

Henry I, character of his rule,
43.

Henry II, puts down feudalism, 43;
establishes the jury-system in
England, 44, 45.

Henry III, coniirms Magna Charta,
50 ; defeated at Lewes by Simon
de Montfort, 57.

Henry IV, power of Parliament at
time of his accession, 81.

Henry V, his popular and heroic
qualities, 82; his democratic
spirit, 83.

Henry VI, growth of idea of jus
divinum under, 86.

Henry VII, weakness of the nobil-
ity under, 94.

Henry VIH, great increase of royal
power under, 94; strikes down
the Church, 95 ; his character and
influence, 96, etc.

Heretoga, the primitive army-lead-
er, 7.

High Commission, Court of, its es-
tablishment and character, 101,
102; its activity under the Stu-
arts, 106.

Holland, its ocean-war with the
Commonwealth, 158; an oligar-
chy at end of 17th century, 168 ;
l^artially adopts Anglo-Saxon in-
stitutions, 271.

Howard, George E., his "Introduc-
tion to the Local Constitutional
History of the United States"

INDEX.

411

cited, 3, 9, 113, 116, 119, 120, 126,
127, 286, 290, 294, 296, 297.

Huguenots, their number in Eng-
land after tlie Eeyocation ol tiie
Edict of Nantes, 172.

Hundred, tlie division between the
tun and the scire, 6.

Hungary, partially adopts Anglo-
Saxon institutions, 271.

Hutchinson, Thomas, his "History
of Massachusetts Bay" cited,
216.

Illinois, local government in, 290,
etc.

Immigration, in Bryce's view so
far not injurious to the United
States, 316 ; danger to be appre-
hended from, in the future, 324,
325.

Imperial Federation, a popular
idea in British Empire, 343.

Indented servant, analogous to the
Iset, 9; condition of, in early
Virginia, 123.

Independents, their rise and prin-
ciples, 1.39; seize the power in
England in 1648, 147; ideas of
the party, 154; difficulties in
their way, 155 ; establish a Coun-
cil of State, 156; make war
against Ireland, Scotland, and
Holland, 157, 158; dissensions
among them in 1653, 159.

India, character of English domin-
ion in, 248; village-communities
of, as showing a capacity for
self-government, 271 ; a native ad-
ministration for, anticipated, 272.

Indiana, local government in, 293.

International Review, on munici-
pal government, 302.

International tribunal, suggested
by Sir Edwin Arnold, 318.

Iowa, local government in, 287,
294.

Ireton, army-leader in English
Civil War, 139; at first not in
favor of popular government,
144; reconciled at army prayer-

meeting, December, 1647, 145;
prepares Grand Army Remon-
strance, 147 ; prepares other
army manifestoes, 150; prepares
the second Agreement of the
People, 152.

Irish, sustain American cause in
American Revolution, 226; heavy
immigration into America, 277,
278; England embarrassed by
question concerning, 322, 323;
embarrassment to America from,
352.

Ironsides, name given Cromwell
and his troopers at Marston
Moor, by Prince Rupert, 138 ; ad-
vocate popular government, 140;
their manifestoes, 141 , etc. ; win
their chiefs to their side, their
prayer-meeting, 145; their prow-
ess in 1648, 147 ; in Ireland, 157 ;
at Dunbar and Worcester, 158.

Italy, death of freedom in, 168;
partially adopts in modern times
Anglo-Saxon freedom, 271.

Jack Cade, justice and dignity of
his cause in 15th century, 89, etc.

James I, his autocratic ideas, 105.

James II, his accession, his evil
policy, and good effect of it,
165, 166.

Jamestown, settled, 1607, charac-
ter of the settlement. 111.

Jefferson, Thomas, on the value of
the New England town-meeting,
284.

John, accession of, 46; Magna
Charta extorted from, 47; his
insincerity and death, 50.

Johns Hopkins University, Histori-
cal and Political Tracts of, cited,
3, 8, 9, 115, 116, 278.

Joseph II, of Austria, favors re-
form, 251.

Jury, trial by, established in Eng-
land by Henry II, 45.

Jus divimtm, not claimed by Nor-
man Kings, 42; idea gains
strength in 15th century, 86 ; be-

412

INDEX.

comes portentous under the
Stuarts, 104 ; revives after over
throw of Commonwealth, 163,
164 ; falls out of favor in middle
of 18th century, 177; in vogue
once more under George III,
218.

Kansas, local government in, 287,
293.

Kenilworth, home of Simon de
Montfort, 55, 56.

Kentucky, interested in the puhlic
schools since the Civil War, 296.

King, appears in Anglo-Saxon
polity, how evolved, 18; partly
hereditary and partly elective,
19; how modified by the Nor-
mans, 42 ; power of, depressed
under Henry IV, 81; power of,
nearly doubled under Henry VII,
93 ; still further increased under
Henry VIII, 94; absolutism
claimed for, by the Stuarts, 105 ;
swept away by the Rump, 1649,
154; restored under Charles II,
165; holds title to the colonies,
195; inconsistency of, as regards
the colonies, 196; in " responsible
government " becomes power-
less, 257.

Knights-of-the-shire, appear in
Parliament of 1265, 57; the
champions of the Commons, 64 ;
elected in part by yeomen, 179 ;
in 18th century still the best part
of the House of Commons, 180.

Lsets, n class below the ceorls,
3; analogous to Indians and in-
dented servants, 9.

Laugton, Stephen, Archbishop of
Canterbury, his importance in
securing Magna Charta, 49.

Latimer, Bishop Hugh, his ac-
count of his yeoman father, 134.

Laud, William, Archbishop of Can-
terbury, instrument of Charles I,
in attempt to secure absolutism,
108 ; his fall, 132.

Lecky, W. H., his "History of the
18th Century " cited, 171, 180, 190,
194, 211, 212, 214, 216, 222, 223,
225, 226, 227, 231, 284, 288, 333.

Lee, Richard Henry, his admiration
of New England, 284.

Leeds, misrepresented in the 18th
century, 183.

Legislatures, disposition in the
United States at present to dis-
trust, 275.

Leslie, David, nearly defeats Crom-
well in campaign of Dunbar, 157.

Lessing, G. E., on a narrow national
feeling, 365.

Liberal party, rise of, in England
in 18th century, 190.

Lieber, Dr. Francis, on representa-
tion, 53.

Locke, John, his scheme of a cap-
tain-general for the colonies, 199.

Long Parliament (see Parliament).

Lords, House of, definitely separa-
ted from House of Commons, 68 ;
its weakness under Henry VII,
94 ; impotence under Henry VIH,
96 ; swept away by the Common-
wealth, 1649, 154 ; power of, over
the Commons in 18th century,
175, 185; analogy between, and
the United States Senate, 240,
241; opposes Reform Bill of
1832, 254 ; threatened with aboli-
tion, 255 ; its modern impotence,
258 (see also Parliament) .

Louisiana, its retention of French
forms when admitted to the
Union, 237.

Low, Hon. Seth, on need for Eng-
land of a Rigid Constitution,
263; on municipal government,
302, etc.

Lowell, James Russell, on constitu-
tional restraints, 233; on value,
to the United States of preserv-
ing English traditions, 324.

Macaulay, Mr., English Radical

writer, condemns Burke, 223.
Macaulay, T. B., his "History of

INDEX.

413

England " cited, 15, 62, 100, 164,
166, 169, 178, 183.

Magna Charta, extorted from King
John, 47 ; summary of, 48, 49 ; its
frequent confirmations, appear-
ance of the copy of, in British
Museum, 50 ; full text of. Appen-
dix A; its relation to the idea of
a Eigid Constitution, 234.

Maine, Sir Henry, his ' ' Ancient
Village Communities" cited, 8,
271 ; his " Popular Government "
cited, 21; derives United States
Constitution mainly from Eng-
lish precedents, 236, 238, 240, 241,
242, 243 ; his admiration for Fed-
eral Constitution, 244, 262.

Manchester, unrepresented in 18th
century, 183.

Manor, Norman name for tunscipe,
44.

Mansfield, Lord, chief-justice of
England, his speech on the Stamp
Act, 209.

Mark, the primitive Teutonic vil-
lage, 3.

Marston Moor, hattle of, 138.

Mary Stuart (Queen of Scots) , as a
promoter of Anglo-Saxon free-
dom, 99.

Mary Tudor (Bloody Mary), good
effect of her misrule in arousing
England, 98, 99.

Mary, Queen of William III, ac-
cedes, 107.

Maryland, its early polity, 125 ; in
the 18th century, 194.

Massachusetts, settled, 116; polity
adopted, 117, 192; ecclesiastical
in before American Eevolution,
197; leader in the American
Kevolution, 216 (note).

Massey, his " History of the Eeign
of George III " cited, 210, 264.

Maudint, his " Short View of the
New England Colonies" cited,
216 (note).

May, Sir T. Erskine (Lord Farn-
borough), in Encyclopedia Brit-
annica, 67; his "Constitutional

History of England " cited, 181,
183, 185, 187, 259, 263, 268, 283.

Michigan, local government in,
287, etc.

Middlesex electors, mass meetings
of, over case of Wilkes, 189.

Mill, John Stuart, on educative
power of representative govern-
ment, 12, 13, 283.

Milton, John, his panegyric on
Cromwell, 161.

Minnesota, local government in,
294.

Mir, the Slavic village community,
7; popular government in, 63,
358.

Missouri, local government in, 287,
293; does not appreciate the
township, 294.

Monasteries, dissolution of, under
Henry VIII, 96.

Montesquieu, influence of " Esprit
des Lois" on Constitution-
makers of the United States,
242, 256, 257.

Moot, assembly of the people, its
place of meeting • in primitive
times, its functions, 5; of the
tun analogous to the New Eng-
land town-meeting, 9; it persists
under incipient feudalism, 24 ; of
the shire combines with the
Curia Regis, 44; primordial cell
of Anglo-Saxon freedom, its con-
dition in early America, 127,
etc.; its present condition in
America, 275, etc.

More, Sir Thomas, testifies as to
the decay of the yeomanry, 135.

Morley, John, his " Life of Cob-
den " cited, 261.

Motley, J. Lothrop, his faith in
democracy, 335, 336.

Nabobs, rich adventurers in 18th
century, their influence in Parlia^-
ment, 186.

Naseby, battle of, 138.

Nation (The New York), on mu-
nicipal government, 302.

414

INDEX.

Navigation Laws, of 17th, and 18th
centuries, oppress the colonies,
199.

Nebraska, local government in,
290, 293.

Newcastle, Duke of, his connection
with parliamentary corruption in
18th century, 188.

New England, settlement of, 112;
its character changed by foreign
immigration, 277 (see also Mas-
sachusetts) .

New Model, reconstituted army of
the English Commonwealth, 138.

New Shoreham, illustrates political
corruption of 18th century, 184.

Newspapers, the great, established
in middle of 18th century, their
good influence, 189.

New York, its early polity, 126; its
condition in 18th century, 193;
position and temper of, at outset
of American Revolution, 215; dif-
ficulties of government in city
of, 300.

New Zealand, mapped out by Cap-
tain Cook,' 247; present condi-
tion of, 249.

New Zealand Herald, The, on an
English-speaking brotherhood,
348.

Non-conformists, their services to
freedom, 162; all Whigs, the
commercial class identified vrith,
largely recruited by immigrant
refugees from Catholic lands, 171 ;
their pro-American sympathies,
224.

Non-resistance, to arbitrariness of
kings, favorite theme of the
clergy in time of Charles II and
James II, 164.

Normandy, importance to Eng-
land of loss of, 46.

Normans, they land at Hastings,
27; their battle array, 32; their
danger, 34; their origin and
character, 38, 39.

North, Lord, on embarrassment
from pro-American feeling in

England in American Ke volution ,
222.

North Carolina, local government
in, since Civil War, 297.

Norway, adopts Anglo-Saxon in-
stitutions, 271.

Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, at Has-
tings, 34.

Ohio, early constitution of, 286;
of its local government, 293.

Old Sarum, as illustration of cor-
ruption in borough representa-
tion, 183.

Opposition, function of the, in
Responsible Government, 258.

Ordinances, royal, regarded under
Stuarts as superseding legisla-
tion, 106.

O'Reilly, John Boyle, his poem at
Plymouth, Aug. 1, 1889, quoted,
112, 369.

Oxford, illustrates political corrup-
tion of 18th century, 184.

Parish, rises in importance, 113,
114 ; its form when transplanted
to Virginia, 119; unchanged in
American Revolution, 237.

Parkes, Sir Henry, on an English-
speaking fraternity, 344; on the
superiority of the Chinese, 355.

Parliament of 1265, 57 ; of 1295, 60;
how related to the witenagemote,
63; how constituted under Ed-
ward I, 64; division into two
Houses in 1341, 68; good Parlia-
ment of 1376, 69 ; its hostility to
the peasants in 1380, 79 ; deposes
Richard II and elects Henry IV,
its great power under Henry IV,
its aristocratic temper, 81 ; reac-
tionary in spirit in middle of
15th century, 85, etc. ; shrinks
into an oligarchy, 88 ; lose.s power
undertheTudors,98; described by
Sir Thomas Smith, 100 ; its spirit
rises under the Stuarts, 107; Short
and Long, 131; passes Grand Re-
monstrance, November, 1641, ar-

INDEX.

415

rest of the Five Members resisted
by, 133; at war with the King,
1642, 136 ; negotiates a peace with
Charles I, 1648, 149; purged by
Pride and becomes the Eump,
150 ; ideas of the Kump, 150, etc. ;
dissolved by Cromwell, 1653, 160;
subserviency of, under Charles
II, 164 ; passes the Bill of Bights,
1689, 167 ; recognized as supreme
in 18th century, 173 ; its corrup-
tion, 177. etc.; its arbitrary as-
sumption in the case of Wilkes,
189; assumes jurisdiction over
colonies, 197; agitation for re-
form in, begins with the Wilkes
troubles, 223; furnishes a model
for the Congress of the United
States, 240, 241 ; bottom of abuse
reached in 1816, 252 ; reformed in
1832, 255 ; its working under Ee-
sponsible Grovemment, 257, 258
(see also Lords and Commons) .

Patriotism, when narrow, a mere
expansion of selfishness, 201;
view of Lessing, of Goethe, 365 ;
a narrow patriotism condemned,
366, etc.

Feasants, rebellion of, in 1380,
under Wat Tyler, 75, etc. ; under
Jack Cade, in 1450, 89, etc.

Felham, prime minister, 1745-1754,
honest himself, but stoops to bri-
bery, 178.

Pennsylvania, early polity of, 126 ;
in 18th century, 194; temper of,
at outset of American Revolution,
215.

Petition of Right, 1628, 107; text
of, Appendix B.

Petty, Sir WiUiam, his "Political
Aritlimetic " quoted, 171.

Phelan, his "History of Tennes-
see" quoted, 122.

Phillips, his " Geschichte des Angel-
Sachsischen Eechts " quoted, 3.

Pictou, J. Allanson, on local self-
government in America, 306, 307.

Pilgrims of Plymouth revert in
their polity to old ways, 113.

Pitt, the elder (see Chatham) .

Pitt, William (the younger), de-
nounces the war against America,
225; introduces the question of
parliamentary reform in 1782,
250; leads aristocratic England
against revolutionary France,
252; initiates colonial self-gov-
ernment, 264.

Plain people, their love for Anglo-
Saxon freedom, 327, 328; their
political competency, view of J.
Toulmin Smith, 329; of Bryce,
332; of Lecky, 333; of Addison,
334 ; of Motley, 335, 336 ; of Presi-
dent Eliot of Harvard, 337, etc.

Plantagenets, their masterful qual-
ities, 105.

Plymouth, settled, 1620, character
of the settlers, 112; the method
of settlement at, described, 116.

Pombal, in Portugal, favors re-
forms, 251.

Poor whites, origin of, in the South,
123.

Portugal partially adopts Anglo-
Saxon freedom, 271.

Presbyterians, as a party in the
English Civil War, 139; oppose
Independents in the field, 146.

President of the United States, his
likeness to English King of 18th
century, 238.

Preston, battle of, in 1648, 147.

Pretender, his doubtful birth and
character, 173.

Price, Dr. Richard, leading non-con-
formist, his pro-American sym-
pathies, 224.

Proctor, E. A., on identity of the
two branches of the English-
speaking race, 314, 315.

Public opinion makes itself felt first
in middle of 18th century, 189;
its great power at present, 259.

Publication of parliamentary de-
bates, salutary influence from,
189.

Pyne, John, parliamentary leader
in English Civil War, 131; his

416

INDEX.

great authority, 136; his views,
his death, 137.

Quakers embarrass the patriots in
American Revolution, 226.

Quarter Sessions, Court of, rise oi,
under Edward III, 82 ; supersedes
in part the shire-moot, 114 ; trans-
planted to Virginia, 120; contin-
ues to administer the county in
Virginia and the South, 193, 237.

Quebec, effect of the fall, in 1759,
upon the Thirteen Colonies, 203.

Ramsay, his " History of the Ameri-
can Revolution " cited, 226.

Ransome, his " Rise of Constitu-
tional Government in England "
cited, 104, 182.

Reform Bill of 1832, first introduced,
March, 1831, its provisions, 253 ;
its second introduction, 254; its
passage and happy results, 255;
supplemented in 1867 and 1884,
256.

Reformation helps in England the
power of the Crown, 96.

Reign of Terror in France, reaction
from excesses of, 251.

Representation in politics an Anglo-
Saxon idea, 9; first appears as
regards the national council in
1213, 46 ; its vitality in the early
shire-moot, 52; its value, condi-
tions necessary for its successful
practice, 53, 54 ; those conditions
satisfied in England, 55 ; appears
in Parliament of 1265, 57; con-
firmed under Edward I, 60; in
Spain, Germany, Italy, and
France, 62 ; a burden rather than
a privilege at first, 65 ; its char-
acter in New England, 128; its
decay in England in 18th cen-
tury, 175 ; degeneracy of, in the
English shires, 178, etc.; power
over, of the nobles and the rich,

' 180 ; of Thirteen Colonies, Chat-
ham's view of, 208; Camden's
and Mansfield's, 209; Burke's,

Yorge's, and Lecky's, 211 ; Rich-
ard Bland of Virginia on, in
Great Britain, 213 ; fairly secured
to the English nation in 1832, 255.

Representatives, House of, of United
States, modelled onEnglish House
of Commons, 240.

Responsible Government, itsprigin,
174 ; description of, 257, 258 ; be-
stowed upon the new colonial
empire, 266.

Restoration, reaction from ideas of
the Commonwealth at, 163.

Revolution of 1688, momentous
character of the crisis, 167, etc. ;
merely a restoring of the old sys-
tem, 169; its partial character,
174.

Revolution, American, how it came
on, 192, etc. ; a struggle of par-
ties, not countries, 218, etc. ; sup-
ported by a strong minority in
Parliament, by a large party out-
side, 221.

Revolution, French, excesses of,
arrest progress in England, 260,
251.

Rhode Island, agreement of settlers
in 1637 a germ of the Constitu-
tion, 234.

Richard I, his bad rule, 46.

Richard II, his bearing before the
rebellious peasants, 75; his por-
trait in Westminster Abbey, 76 ;
at Wat Tyler's death, 77; his
treachery, 78 ; his absolutism and
deposition, 80.

Richard III, his accession, 92.

Richmond, Duke of, pro-American
in American Revolution, 224.

Rivington, his "Independence the
Object of Congress in America"
cited, 216.

Robinson, John, pastor of the Pil-
grim Fathers, 112.

Rogers, J. Thorold, his "History
of Agriculture and Prices " cited,
65, 77.

Roman de Rou, Norman poem on
the Conquest, 30, 31, 33.

INDEX.

417

Eomilly, Sir Samuel, on political
corruption in his time, 187.

Rousseau, his wide influence, 251.

Bump (see Parliament).

Eunnymede, as seen from Windsor
Castle, 47.

Rupert, Prince, at Edgehill, 137; at
Marston Moor and Naseby, 138.

Rushworth, his " Historical Collec-
tions " cited, 142, 147.

Russell, Lord John, introduces the
Reform Bill in 1831, 253.

Russia, her great future predicted
by Gladstone, 357 ; sketch of her
empire, of her people and institu-
tions, 358; of her history, 359;
characteristics of the present des-
potism, 360; her vast power, 361;
as a rival of Anglo-Saxondom,
362, etc.

Ryley, Gulielmus, his " Placita
Parliamentaria " cited, 68.

Sabine, Lorenzo, his " American
Loyalists " cited, 227.

Salisbury, illustrates abuses of rep-
resentation in the 18th century,
183.

Saturday Beview, The, London, on
Strafford and his policy, 275.

Scotch, Vane negotiates Solemn
League and Covenant with, 138;
defeated by Cromwell at Preston,

1648, 147; crown Charles 11, in

1649, and make war on English
Commonwealth, 157 ; defeated at
Dunbar and Worcester, 158 ; im-
migrants largely Tory in Ameri-
can Revolution, 226.

Seeley, J. R., his " Expansion of
England " cited, on leadership of
New England in American Revo-
lution, 216 (note) ; on Imperial
Federation, 343.

Self-Denying Ordinance, of 1645,
138.

Senate, of the United States, anal-
ogy between, and the House of
Lords, 240; a fortunate creation
of the Constitution-makers, 241.

Separatists, sect of the Pilgrim
Fathers, 112.

Shaw, Albert, on local government
in Illinois, in Johns Hopkins
University Studies, cited, 290.

Ship-money, an illegal exaction
under Charles I, 109.

Shire, its character in primitive
times, 18; misfortunes to repre-
sentations in, 180 (see also Moot).

Simon de Montfort, his origin, 56;
convenes the Parliament of 1265,
57 ; his death and influence, 58.

Slav (see Russia) .

Slavery, reasons for its develop-
ment in Virginia, 123.

Smith, Adam, his "Wealth of Na-
tions" cited, 199; favors setting
free the Thirteen Colonies, 222.

Smith, Goldwin, on a moral union
of the Anglo-Saxon race, 344.

Smith, J. Toulmin, his " Local Self-
Government and Centralization "
cited, 3, 14, 53, 54, 283, 329, 330.

Social compact on board the " May-
flower," its relation to a Rigid
Constitution, 234.

Solemn League and Covenant, ne-
gotiated by Vane with the Scotch,
1643, 138.

South, in United States, Virginia
leader and typical colony of. 111,
295 ; change of spirit in, since the
Civil War, 296.

South Africa, becomes an English
possession, 247; present condi-
tion of, 249.

South Carolina, its early polity,
125 ; temper at outset of Ameri-
can Revolution, 216.

Southey, his early enthusiasm for
free ideas, 251.

Spain, destruction of freedom in,
168 ; partially adopts Anglo-Sax-
on freedom, 271.

Stamp Act, colonies exasperated
by, 206 ; debate on, in Parliament,
207, etc. ; question as to, summed
up, 210, 211; importance of de-
bate on, to England, 212.

418

INDEX.

Stanley, Dean, his "Memorials of
Westminster Abbey" quoted, 76.

Star-Chamber, Court of, its estab-
lishment and character, 101, 102;
active under the Stuarts, 106.

States-General, in France, loses
power and disappears, 168.

Statute of Laborers, of 14th cen-
tury, 72, 73.

Stephen, King, sway of feudalism
in his reign, 43.

Story, " On the Constitution,"
cited, 196.

Stoughton, on high character of the
New England settlers, 214.

Strafford, Weutworth, Earl of,
agent of absolutism of Charles I,
108; his execution, 132; Traill's
Life of, referred to, 275.

Stuarts, their incompetency as
rulers, 105; general lack of
manly and womanly worth, 173 ;
abridge the franchise, 182.

Stubbs, his "Constitutional His-
tory" cited, 2, 42, 48, 49, 52, 58,
60, 95, 100.

Sudbury, illustrates abuses in bor-
ough representation, 184.

Sugar Act, hardship of its opera-
tion in Thirteen Colonies, 200.

Supervisor, office of, in Township-
County system of local govern-
ment, 126, 289.

Supporters of the Bill of Eights,
Society of the, their democratic
ideas, 223.

Supremacy, Act of, under Eliza-
beth, 100, 101.

Supreme Court of the United
States, based on English prece-
dents, 241.

Sweden, partially adopts Anglo-
Saxon freedom, 271.

Tacitus, his " Germania" cited, 2.
Taillefer, the Norman minstrel at

Hastings, story of, 32, 33.
Taswell-Langmead , his " English

Constitutional History " cited, 2,

22, 60, 70, 86, 100.

Taylor, Hannis, his "Origin and
Growth of the English Constitu-
tion " cited, 2, 50, 81, 121, 253, 256.

Tennessee, interested in public
schools since the Civil War, 296.

Tennyson, Alfred, his ode at open-
ing of the Colonial Exhibition,
1886, 269.

Texas, interested in public schools
since Civil War, 296.

Thackeray, Rev. S. W., his "Land
and the Community " cited, 83,
262.

Thackeray, W. M., on mistake of
England in the American Revo-
lution, 349.

Thegns, class of, originate from the
Gesith, 19.

Theows, slaves of the Anglo-Sax-
ons, 4.

Thomson, his "Historical Essay
on Magna Charta " cited, 51.

Thorough, policy of Laud and
Strafford under Charles 1, 108.

Tobacco, importance of, in deter-
mining the form of Virginia soci-
ety, 123.

Tories, their origin and principles
in England, 170; doubtful strug-
gle with Whigs at opening of 18th
century, 172; their connection
with parliamentary corruption,
■178; of America, their strength,
225, etc. ; their high position and
character, 227; pathetic circum-
stances of their exile, 228, etc.;
in England, favor in modern
times self-government in colo-
nies, 265.

Town-meeting of New England,
analogous to ancient folk-moot,
9; early New England town-
meeting, 117; not changed by the
Revolution, 237; its present con-
dition, 277, etc.; drawbacks of,
283 ; tributes to its value, 284.

Town-system of local self-govern-
ment, described, 276, etc. ; carried
by New Englanders to the West,
285.

INDEX.

419

Township-County system of loeal
self-government, its germ found
in New York, 126; prevalent in
Middle and Western States, 277 ;
as found in Michigan, 289, 290 ;
in Illinois, 292, 293; in Wiscon-
sin, Nebraska, Ohio, Indiana,
Missouri, Kansas, 293; in Iowa,
Minnesota, the Dakotas, 294.

Traill, his "Life of Strafford"
cited, 275.

Tucker, Dean, favors freedom of
the Thirteen Colonies, 222.

Tudors, their arbitrary temper, 100
(why partially thwarted, 102) ;
their masterful qualities, 105;
create rotten boroughs, 182.

Tun, of the primitive Teutonic
mark, 3 ; reproduced to some ex-
tent in New England, 116.

Unification, a tendency toward,
among modern nations, benefits
from It to humanity and to the
individual, 368, 369.

Uniformity, Act of, under Eliza^
beth, 100, 101.

United States, polity of, compared
with that of Anglo-Saxons, 8, 9 ;
germ to be found in early Teu-
tonic communities, 10; adopt
Federal Constitution, 235; base
it on English precedents, 236,
etc. ; contrast between founders
of, and those of other republics,
236; stability of, due to great
amount of England imbedded in
them, 243; condition of moral
population in, as regards the
popular moot, 276, etc. ; Town-
ship-County system likely some
day to become uniform type of
local government in, 298 ; condi-
tion of urban population in, rapid
increase in size and number of
cities not necessarily an evil,
299; government of cities the
one conspicuous failure of, 300;
people of, of undoubted Anglo-
Saxon stock, 313; testimony to
this of Matthew Arnold, 314 ; of

R. A. Proctor, 314, 31S ; of Bryce,
315, 316; of Sir Edwin Arnold,
317, 318; embarrassments of, at
present moment, 323, 324 ; indif-
ference in, to idea of an Anglo-
Saxon brotherhood, 348.

Universities, English, almost uni-
formly hostile to political prog-
ress, 333.

University of Oxford, advocates
absolutism under James I, 105 ;
dislike of liberty in, in present
century, 333.

Vamb&y, Arminius, on the colo-
nial position of England, 357.

Vane, the writer's "Life of Young
Sir Henry" cited, 139, 141, etc.;
145, 154, 155, 162.

Vane, Young Sir Henry, negotiates
the Solemn League and Cove-
nant, 138; not at first in favor
of popular liberty, 145 ; condemns
execution of Charles 1, 156 ; quar-
rels with Cromwell, 159; his
" Healing Question," 235.

Victoria, Queen, at opening of the
Colonial Exhibition in 1886, 269,
270.

Villeinage, origin of, 23; grades
and character of, under Norman
Kings, 45; condition of, in 14th
century, 70, 71.

Virginia, company, chartered, 1606,
begirming of English coloniza-
tion of America, 111; develop-
ment of polity in, 118, etc. ; re-
produces contemporary England,
119 ; her parishes, vestries, coun-
ties, and Courts of Quarter Ses-
sions, 119, etc.; her condition in
18th century, 193; ecclesiastical
grievance in, 197; temper of, at
outset of American Eevolution,
215; local government in, since
Civil War, 296.

Von Maurer, his " Mark-Verf as-
sung " cited, 2.

Waltz, his " Deutsche Verfassungs-
geschichte " cited, 2.

420

INDEX.

Walpole, Horace, on transferrence
of the true English to America,
110; helieves American Revolu-
tion saves English freedom, 222,

Walpole, Sir Robert, his connec-
tion with parliamentary corrup-
tion, 188.

Wapentake, name for hundred, 18.

Washington, his position as com-
pared with that of Wat Tyler and
Jack Cade, 91 ; fears strength of
the Tories in American Revolu-
tion, 226; celebration of centen-
nial of his inauguration, April 30,
1889, 327.

Wat Tyler, leader of peasant re-
bellion in 1380, 76 ; his death and
character, 77.

Waterloo, battle of, brings cessa-
tion of reaction against French
Revolution, 252.

Weser, scene at mouth of river, 2.

West, settlement of the, in United
States, 285.

West Indies, assured to England,
248; character of her dominion
in, 249.

West Virginia, local government
in, 297.

Westminster Review, The, on mis-
appreciation of England by
America, 219 ; on India, 272 ; on
an English-speaking brother-
hood, 345, etc.

Whigs, their origin and princi-
ples, 170; affiliated with non-
conformists and the commercial
class, 171 ; doubtful struggle with
Tories at beginning of 18th cen-
tury, 172; their connection with
parliamentary corruption, 178 ;
favor self-government in the
colonies, 265.

Whitlocke, his " Memorials " cited,
147.

Wilkes, England roused from
apathy by case of, 189.

William I fthe Conqueror), lands
at Hastings, 27; instance of his
tact, 28; his generalship and
bravery, 34 ; as a victor, 35 ; his

character, 36; nature of his rule,
40; maintains a large portion of
the old order, 41.

William II (Rufus), character of
his rule, 43.

William III (of Orange) , his acces-
sion, 167 ; his character, 172, 173 ;
stoops to bribery, 178.

William IV, and Reform Bill of
1832, 255.

William Grindeeobbe, heroic peas-
ant in 1380, 78.

Wilson, Woodrow, cited, 353.

Windsor Castle, view from, 47.

Winsor, Justin, his " Narrative
and Critical History of America "
cited, 194, 220.

Winthrop, John, settles Boston,
116.

Wisconsin, local government in,
290, 293.

Witenagemote, origin of, 20; per-
sists under the Norman Kings,
43; how developed into Parlia^
ment, 63.

Worcester, battle of, 1651, 158.

Wordsworth, his early enthusiasm
for freedom, 251.

Writs of Assistance, Thirteen Colo-
nies exasperated by, 205.

Wyatt's rebellion, against Mary
Tudor, 99.

Yeomen, their rise, character, and
position, 65; as settlers of New
England, 121, 122; give strength
to the Roundheads in the Civil
War, 134 ; their value as soldiers,
136; have an influence in elect-
ing knights-of-the-shire, history
of their decline, 179; rapid in
18th century, 180; their revival
anticipated, 311.

Yonge, his " Constitutional His-
tory of England " cited, 211, 265.

Yorkshire freeholders, mass-meet-
ings of, 189.

Zincke, F. Barham, on future great-
ness of the English-speaking
race, 309, etc.

Typography by J. S. Gushing & Co., Boston.

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